All was confusion and dismay at Tilney. Bella Lyle's cold turned out to be scarlatina, and Mark and Alice brought back tidings that old Commodore Graham had been seized with a fit, and was seriously, if not dangerously, ill. Of course, the company scattered like an exploded shell. The Graham girls hastened back to their father, while the other guests sought safety in flight, the great struggle now being who should soonest secure post-horses to get away. Like many old people rich in this world's comforts, Mrs. Maxwell had an especial aversion to illness in any shape. It was a topic she never spoke on; and, if she could, would never have mentioned before her. Her intimates understood this thoroughly, and many were the expressions employed to imply that Mr. Such-a-one had a fever, or Mrs. So-and-so was given over by her doctors. As to the fatal result itself, it was always veiled in a sort of decent mystery, as though it would not be perfectly polite to inquire whither the missing friend had retired to.

“Dr. Reede says it is a very mild case of the malady, and that Bella will be up in a day or two, aunt,” said Alice.

“Of course she will,” replied the old lady, pettishly. “It 's just a cold and sore throat,—they had n't that fine name for it long ago, and people got well all the sooner. Is he gone?”

“No; he's talking with Mark in the library; he'll be telling him, I think, about the Commodore.”

“Well, don't ask him to stop to dinner; we have sorrow enough without seeing a doctor.”

“Oh, here comes Mark! Where is Dr. Reede?”

“He's gone over to see Maitland. Fenton came to say that he wished to see him.”

“Surely he's not ill,” said Alice.

“Oh, dear! what a misfortune that would be!” cried the old lady, with real affliction in her tone; “to think of Mr. Norman Maitland taking ill in one's house.”

“Have n't you been over to ask after him, Mark?”

“No. I was waiting till Reede came back: he's one of those men that can't bear being inquired after; and if it should turn out that he was not ill, he 'd not take the anxiety in good part.”

“How he has contrived to play the tyrant to you all, I can't imagine,” said Alice; “but I can see that every whim and caprice he practises is studied as courtiers study the moods of their masters.”

“To be sure, darling, naturally,” broke in Mrs. Maxwell, who always misunderstood everybody. “Of course, we are only too happy to indulge him in a whim or fancy; and if the doctor thinks turtle would suit him—turtle is so light; I took it for several weeks for luncheon—we can have it at once. Will you touch the bell, Mark, and I'll tell Raikes to telegraph? Who is it he gets it from?”

Mark pulled the bell, but took no notice of her question. “I wish,” muttered he below his breath, “we had never come here. There 's Bella now, laid up, and here 's Maitland. I 'm certain he's going away, for I overheard Fenton ask about the distance to Dundalk.”

“I suppose we might survive even that misfortune,” said she, haughtily.

“And one thing I'll swear to,” said Mark, walking the room with impatience,—“it 's the last Ireland will see of him.”

“Poor Ireland! the failure in the potato-crop was bad enough, but this is more than can be endured.”

“That's all very fine, Alice, but I 'm much mistaken if you are as indifferent as you pretend.”

“Mark! what do you mean?” said she, angrily.

“Here's Raikes now; and will some one tell him what it is we want?” said Mrs. Maxwell; but the others were far too deeply engaged in their own whispered controversy now to mind her.

“Captain Lyle will tell you by and by, Raikes,” said she, gathering up the mass of loose impedimenta with which she usually moved from one room to the other, and by which, as they fell at every step, her course could always be tracked. “He'll tell you,” added she, moving away. “I think it was caviare, and you are to telegraph for it to Swan and Edgar's—but my head is confused to-day; I'll just go and lie down.”

As Mrs. Maxwell left by one door, Alice passed out by another; while Mark, whose temper evinced itself in a flushed cheek and a contracted brow, stood at a window, fretfully tapping the ground with his foot.

“Have you any orders, sir?” asked Raikes.

“Orders! No—stay a moment Have many gone away this morning?”

“Nearly all, sir. Except your family and Mr. Maitland, there's nobody left but Major Clough, and he 's going, I believe, with Dr. Reede.”

“You 've heard nothing of Mr. Maitland going, have you?”

“Oh, yes, sir! his man sent for post-horses about an hour ago.”

Muttering impatiently below his breath, Mark opened the window and passed out upon the lawn. What an unlucky turn had everything taken! It was but a week ago, and his friend Maitland was in high delight with all around him. The country, the scenery, the people were all charming; indeed, in the intervals between the showers, he had a good word to say for the climate. As for Lyle Abbey, he pronounced it the perfection of a country-house; and Mark actually speculated on the time when these opinions of his distinguished friend would have acquired a certain currency, and the judgment of one that none disputed would be recorded of his father's house. And all these successes were now to be reversed by this stupid old sailor's folly,—insanity he might call it; for what other word could characterize the pretension that could claim Norman Maitland for a son-in-law?—Maitland, that might have married, if the law would have let him, half a score of infantas and archduchesses, and who had but to choose throughout Europe the alliance that would suit him. And Alice—what could Alice mean by this impertinent tone she was taking towards him? Had the great man's patience given way under it all, and was he really going away, wearied and tired out?

While Mark thus doubted and reasoned and questioned, Maitland was seated at his breakfast at one side of the fire, while Dr. Reede confronted him at the other.

Though Maitland had sent a message to say he wished to see the doctor, he only gave him now a divided attention, being deeply engaged, even as he talked, in deciphering a telegram which had just reached him, and which was only intelligible through a key to the cipher.

“So, then, doctor, it is simply the return of an old attack,—a thing to be expected, in fact, at his time of life?”

“Precisely, sir. He had one last autumn twelve month, brought on by a fit of passion. The old Commodore gives way, rather, to temper.”

“Ah! gives way, does he?” muttered Maitland, while he mumbled below his breath, “'seventeen thousand and four D + X, and a gamba,'—a very large blood-letting. By the way, doctor, is not bleeding—bleeding largely—a critical remedy with a man of seventy-six or seven?”

“Very much so, indeed, sir; and, if you observe, I only applied some leeches to the nuchÆ. You misapprehended me in thinking I took blood from him freely.”

“Oh, yes, very true,” said Maitland, recovering himself. “I have no doubt you treated him with great judgment. It is a case, too, for much caution. Forty-seven and two G's,” and he hastily turned over the leaves of his little book, muttering continually, “and two G's, forty-six, forty-seven, with two B's, two F's. Ah! here it is. Shivering attacks are dangerous—are they—in these cases?”

“In which cases?” asked the doctor; for his shrewd intelligence at once perceived the double object which Maitland was trying to contemplate.

“In a word, then,” continued Maitland, not heeding the doctor's question, but bending his gaze fixedly on the piece of paper before him, scrawled over and blotted by his own hand,—“in a word, then, a man of seventy, seized with paralysis, and, though partially rallied by bleeding, attacked with shivering, is in a very critical state? But how long might he live in that way?”

“We are not now speaking of Commodore Graham, I apprehend?” asked the doctor, slyly.

“No; I am simply putting a case,—a possible case, Doctors, I know, are not fond of these imagined emergencies; lawyers like them.”

“Doctors dislike them,” broke in Reede, “because they are never given to them in any completeness,—every important sign of pulse and tongue and temperature omitted—”

“Of course you are right,” said Maitland, crumpling up the telegram and the other papers; “and now for the Commodore. You are not apprehensive of anything serious, I hope?”

“It 's an anxious case, sir,—a very anxious case; he 's eighty-four.”

“Eighty-four!” repeated Maitland, to whom the words conveyed a considerable significance.

“Eighty-four!” repeated the other, once more. “No one would suspect it. Why, Sally Graham is the same age as my wife; they were at school together.”

Too polite to push a question which involved a double-shotted answer, Maitland merely said, “Indeed!” and, after a slight pause, added, “You said, I think, that the road to Dundalk led past Commodore Graham's cottage?”

“By the very gate.”

“May I offer you a seat with me? I am going that way. I have received news which calls me suddenly to England.”

“I thank you much, but I have some visits yet to make before I return to Port-Graham. I promised to stop the night there.”

Having charged the doctor to convey to the Commodore's daughters his sincere regret for their father's illness, and his no less sincere hope of a speedy recovery, Maitland endeavored, in recognition of a preliminary question or two about himself, to press the acceptance of a fee; but the doctor, armed with that self-respect and tact his profession so eminently upholds, refused to accept it, and took his leave, perhaps well requited in having seen and spoken with the great Mr. Norman Maitland, of whom half the country round were daily talking.

“Mr. Maitland is not ill, I hope?” said Alice, as she met the doctor on his way through the garden.

“No, Mrs. Trafford; I have been making a friendly call—no more,” said the doctor, rather vain that he could thus designate his visit; and with a few words of advice about her sister, he went his way. Alice, meanwhile, saw that Maitland had observed her from his window, and rightly guessed that he would soon be in search of her.

With that feminine instinct that never deceives in such cases, she determined that whatever was to pass between them should be undisturbed. She selected a most unfrequented path, bordered on one side by the high laurel-hedge, and on the other by a little rivulet, beyond which lay some rich meadows, backed in the distance by a thick plantation.

She had not gone far when she beard a short quick footstep behind her, and in a few minutes Maitland was at her side. “You forgot to liberate me,” said he, “so I had to break my arrest.”

“Signor mio, you must forgive me; we have had such a morning of confusion and trouble: first, Bella ill,—not seriously, but confined to bed; and then this poor old Commodore,—the doctor has told you all about it; and, last of all, Mark storming about the house, and angry with every one for having caught cold or a fever, and so disgusted (the great) Mr. Maitland that he is actually hurrying away, with a vow to heaven nevermore to put foot in Ireland.”

“Be a little serious, and tell me of your mission this morning,” said he, gravely.

“Three words will do it. We reached Port-Graham just as the doctor arrived there. The Commodore, it seemed, got home all safe by about four o'clock in the morning; and instead of going to bed, ordered a fire in his dressing-room, and a bottle of mulled port; with which aids to comfort he sat down to write. It would not appear, however, that he had got far in his correspondence, for at six, when his man entered, he found but two lines, and his master, as he thought, fast asleep; but which proved to be a fit of some kind, for he was perfectly insensible. He rallied, however, and recognized his servant, and asked for the girls. And now Dr. Reede thinks that the danger has in a great measure passed off, and that all will go well.”

“It is most unhappy,—most unhappy,” muttered Mainland. “I am sincerely sorry for it all.”

“Of course you are, though perhaps not really to blame,—at least, not blamable in a high degree.”

“Not in any degree, Mrs. Trafford.”

“That must be a matter of opinion. At all events, your secret is safe, for the old man has totally forgotten all that occurred last night between you; and lest any clew to it should remain, I carried away the beginning of the letter he was writing. Here it is.”

“How thoughtfully done!” said he, as he took the paper and read aloud: “'Dear Triphook, come over and help me to a shot at a rascal'—not civil, certainly—'at a rascal; that because he calls himself—' It was well he got no further,” added he, with a faint smile.

“A good, bold hand it is too for such an old man. I declare, Mr. Maitland, I think your usual luck must have befriended you here. The fingers that held the pen so steadily might have been just as unshaken with the pistol.”

There was something so provocative in her tone that Maitland detected the speech at once, and became curious to trace it to a cause. At this sally, however, he only smiled in silence.

“I tried to persuade Mark to drive over and see Tony Butler,” continued she, “but he would n't consent: in fact, a general impulse to be disobliging would appear to have seized on the world just now. Don't you think so?”

“By the way, I forgot to tell you that your protÉgÉ Butler refuses to accept my offer. I got three lines from him, very dry and concise, saying 'no' to me. Of course I trust to your discretion never to disclose the negotiation in any way. I myself shall never speak of it; indeed, I am very little given to doing civil things, and even less accustomed to finding them ill-received, so that my secrecy is insured.”

“He ought not to have refused,” said she, thoughtfully.

“Perhaps not.”

“He ought certainly to have given the matter more consideration. I wish I could have been consulted by him. Is it too late yet?”

“I suspect it is,” said he, dryly. “First of all, as I told you, I am little in the habit of meeting a repulse; and, secondly, there is no time to renew the negotiation. I must leave this to-day.”

“To-day?”

“Within an hour,” added he, looking at his watch; “I must manage to reach Dublin in time to catch the mail-packet to-morrow morning.”

“This is very sudden, this determination.”

“Yes, I am called away by tidings I received awhile ago,—tidings of, to me, the deepest importance.”

“Mark will be extremely sorry,” said she, in a low tone.

“Not sorrier than I am,” said he, despondently.

“We all counted on your coming back with us to the Abbey; and it was only awhile ago Bella begged that we should wait here for a day or two, that we might return together, a family party.”

“What a flattery there is in the phrase!” said he, with deep feeling.

“You don't know,” continued she, “what a favorite you are with my mother. I dare not trust myself to repeat how she speaks of you.”

“Why will you multiply my regrets, Mrs. Trafford? Why will you make my parting so very, very painful?”

“Because I prefer that you should stay; because I speak in the name of a whole house who will be afflicted at your going.”

“You have told me of all save one,” said be, in a voice of deepest feeling; “I want to learn what she thinks.”

“She thinks that if Mr. Maitland's good-nature be only on a par with his other qualities, he would sooner face the tiresomeness of a stupid house than make the owners of it feel that they bored him.”

“She does not think anything of the kind,” said he, with a peculiar smile. “She knows that there is no question of good nature or of boredom in the matter at all; but there is something at stake far more touching than either.” He waited to see if she would speak, but as she was silent he went on: “I will be honest, if you will not. I am not going away of my freewill. I have been called by a telegram this morning to the Continent; the matter is so pressing that—shall I confess it?—if this stupid meeting with the Commodore had been arranged, I should have been a defaulter. Yes, I'd have made I don't well know what explanation to account for my absence. I can imagine what comments would have been passed upon my conduct. I feel very painfully, too, for the part I should have left to such of my friends here as would defend me, and yet have not a fragment to guide their defence. And still, with all these before me, I repeat, I would have gone away, so imminent is the case that calls me, and so much is the matter one that involves the whole future of my life. And now,” said he, while his voice became fuller and bolder, “that I have told you this, I am ready to tell you more, and to say that at one word of yours—one little word—I 'll remain.”

“And what may that word be?” said she, quietly; for while he was speaking she had been preparing herself for some such issue.

“I need not tell you,” said he, gravely.

“Supposing, then, that I guess it,—I am not sure that I do,—but suppose that,—and could it not be just as well said by another,—by Bella, for instance?”

“You know it could not. This is only fencing, for you know it could not.”

“You mean, in fact, that I should say, 'don't go?'”

“I do.”

“Well, I 'm willing enough to say so, if my words are not to convey more than I intend by them.”

“I 'll risk even that,” said he, quickly. “Put your name to the bond, and we 'll let lawyers declare what it is worth after.”

“You frighten me, Mr. Maitland,” said she, and her tone showed that now at least she was sincere.

“Listen to me for one moment, Alice,” said he, taking her hand as he walked beside her. “You are fully as much the mistress of your fate as I am master of mine. You may consult, but you need not obey. Had it been otherwise, I never would have dared on a hardihood that would probably have wrecked my hopes. It is just as likely I never could satisfy the friends about you on the score of my fortune,—my means,—my station, and so on. It is possible, too, that scandal, which makes free with better men, may not have spared me, and that they who would have the right to advise you might say, 'Beware of that dreadful man.' I repeat, this is an ordeal my pride would feel it hard to pass through; and so I come to you, in all frankness, and declare I love you. To you—you alone—I will give every guarantee that a man may give of his honor and honesty. I will tell all my past, and so much as I mean for the future; and in return, I only ask for time,—nothing but time, Alice. I am not asking you for any pledge, simply that you will give me—what you would not have refused a mere acquaintance—the happiness of seeing you daily; and if—if, I say, you yourself should not deem the hand and the love I offer beneath you,—if you should be satisfied with the claims of him who would share his fortune with you,—that then—not till then—others should hear of it. Is this too much for me to ask, or you to give, Alice?”

“Even now I do not know what you ask of me.”

“First of all, that you bid me stay.”

“It is but this moment you have declared to me that what calls you away is of the very last importance to you in life.”

“The last but one, Alice,—the last is here;” and he kissed her hand as he spoke, but still with an air so deferent that she could not resent it.

“I cannot consent that it shall be so,” said she, with energy. “It is true I am my own mistress, and there is but the greater reason why I should be more cautious. We are almost strangers to each other. All the flattery of your professions—and of course, I feel it as flattery—does not blind me to the fact that I scarcely know you at all.”

“Why not consent to know me more?” asked he, almost imploringly.

“I agree, if no pledge is to accompany my consent.”

“Is not this a somewhat hard condition?” said he, with a voice of passionate meaning. “You bid me, in one word, place all that I have of hope on the issue,—not even on that, but simply for leave to play the game. Is this generous, Alice,—is it even just?”

“You bewilder me with all these subtleties, and I might ask if this were either just or generous; but at least, I will be frank. I like you very well. I think it not at all impossible that I might like you better; but even after that, Mr. Mainland, there would be a long stage to travel to that degree of regard which you profess to desire from me. Do I make myself understood?”

“Too well for me and my hopes!” said he, despondingly. “You are able, however, to impose hard conditions.”

“I impose none, sir. Do not mistake me.”

“You leave none others open to me, at least, and I accept them. To give me even that faint chance of success, however, I must leave this to-day. Is it not better I should?”

“I really cannot advise,” said she, with a well-assumed coldness.

“Even contingently, Mrs. Trafford will not involve herself in my fortunes,” said he, half haughtily. “Well, my journey to Ireland, amongst other benefits, has taught me a lesson that all my wanderings never imparted. I have at last learned something of humility. Good-bye.”

“Good-bye, Mr. Maitland,” said she, with calm, but evidently not without effort.

He stooped and kissed her hand, held it for a moment or two in his own, and with a very faint “Good-bye,” turned away and left her. He turned suddenly around after a few paces, and came back. “May I ask one question, Alice, before I go?”

“I don't know whether I shall answer it,” said she, with a faint smile.

“I cannot afford to add jealousy to my other torments. Tell me, then—”

“Take care, sir, take care; your question may cost you more than you think of.”

“Good-bye,—good-bye,” said he, sadly, and departed. “Are the horses ready, Fenton?” asked he, as his servant came to meet him.

“Yes, sir; and Captain Lyle has been looking for you all over the garden.”

“He's going,—he 's off, Bella,” said Alice, as she sat down beside her sister's bed, throwing her bonnet carelessly down at her feet.

“Who is going?—who is off?” asked Bella, eagerly.

“Of course,” continued Alice, following up her own thoughts, “to say 'Stay' means more than I like to be pledged to,—I couldn't do it.”

“Poor Tony!—give him my love, Alice, and tell him I shall often think of him,—as often as ever I think of bygone days and all their happiness.”

“And why must it be Tony that I spoke of?” said Alice, rising, while a deep crimson flush covered her face and brow. “I think Master Tony has shown us latterly that he has forgotten the long ago, and has no wish to connect us with thoughts of the future.”