Marmaduke Muir's repentances, like many of his virtues and vices, were apt to be evanescent. So the next week, it is to be feared, saw many a lapse from his intention that drunkenness should not occur again. In truth it needed a strong will to be sober in Drummuir Castle. The old lord himself had a head which nothing could upset, and though he went to his bed groaning with gout, no one could have said his wits were in the least astray. Now Marmaduke had to a certain extent inherited this toleration of alcohol, a fact which at once gratified his father and set the old sinner to the graceless task of inciting his son to more and more glasses of good claret, champagne, and port in order to see how far the inheritance went. And Marmaduke, partly because he was anxious to ingratiate himself with his irascible parent and partly from sheer joie de vivre, fell in with the old man's whim. In reality it meant much to him that he should get to the right side of his father. He had a chance of his majority if only fifteen hundred pounds odd could be found over and above the regulation purchase money. It was a big price; but the vacancy was in a crack Highland regiment and the majority would give him almost the certainty of commanding in the future.

"The peer has never done anything for me in his life," he said angrily to Jack Jardine. "I've gone into a West India regiment. I've lived on my pay--and your allowance, old chap. By the way, I do wish you'd make up accounts between us. We three brothers must owe you a lot already, and though we've all given our post obits on the property when the old man dies, I myself don't like it. Worries me when I have a headache, you know!"

Jack Jardine smiled. The proposition for a clear account had been made many times in the past ten years, sometimes by one brother, sometimes by another--but generally by Marmaduke--without in any way altering the relative positions of creditor and debtor. So he set the point aside.

"Why should you have a headache, Duke?" he began as a prelude to a sermon on sobriety he had been meditating for some days; but Marmaduke's candour took the words out of his mouth.

"Not the least reason in life, Jack, except that I want and will have my majority, and I must keep straight with the peer till I get the money. Look here, I'll tackle the old man to-morrow, and if I succeed I'll cut and run. I don't drink anywhere else, Jack, I don't indeed--not, I mean to say, drink."

Looking at the speaker's clear, almost boyish, face his hearer could well believe it.

"Your father is suffering a lot from the gout just now," he said, dubiously.

"And he'll go on suffering as long as I'm here, and he wants to make me drunk," retorted Marmaduke, whose perceptions were by no means dense, "so the sooner it's over the better for both of us!"

Accordingly the very next day when, in accordance with his usual custom, he wheeled his parent to the paternal visit to the dower house, Marmaduke broached the subject of finance on the way back. It was not a very auspicious moment, for the old gentleman had been made at once irritable and pious by an unwary allusion on the part of his youngest daughter, Margaret, to the new minister of the parish, the Reverend Patrick Bryce. Now the reverend gentleman in question was at the time Lord Drummuir's bÊte noire. To begin with, he had been presented to the living by the Crown, and the Barons of Drummuir had for generations claimed the right themselves. Evil thinking people, indeed, said that it was this fact which made the old man so wholehearted an advocate of that disruption in the Church of Scotland which was then rending the country in twain. People talked of little else, except railways, and on that point Lord Drummuir held the most conservative of views. They would, he said, not without truth, play the devil with country society and make it impossible for a nobleman to travel in comfort. But no one who knew his lordship ever asked for consistency in his opinions. He simply held them with a tenacity that was perfectly appalling. So the mere mention of the Reverend Patrick Bryce's name, with the addition of a fine blush on his daughter's face when she discovered her slip of the tongue, had put him into a white heat of politeness and piety.

"I am surprised at you, Margaret," he said. "I should prefer your having nothing to do even with the school feasts of a man who, denying the headship of the church to the Almighty, continues to batten on the loaves and fishes of--of--and has the cursed impudence to find fault with other people's meat and drink, too," he added, fiercely.

Despite this, Marmaduke, who had inherited no little of his father's obstinacy, took the opportunity of the bath-chair reaching the finest point of the view to say with a great show of courage--

"By the way, sir, don't you think it's about time to send that money for my majority? Pringle is rather in a hurry to retire, and the price may run up if we don't act soon."

His lordship rather admired this home thrust without warning, but he was on his guard at once and cleared his throat for a speech.

"It's a positive disgrace to our army, and so I told poor Brougham the last time I saw him, that promotion should not only go by purchase but that private individuals should have power to fill their pockets with the proceeds of further extortion. It is a kind of simony; it is the sale of valour, of one's country's good!"

Lord Drummuir was a noted orator when he chose, even in those days when everyone could string words together into high-sounding phrases, and when Edmund Burke's foaming fulminations were held up to the young as models of eloquence; but Marmaduke was obdurate.

"Possibly, sir," he interrupted, "but I want to do it. You see, sir," he warmed with his subject, "I'll be dashed if I've troubled you much in the last ten years--now have I? You've made me an allowance on which I couldn't live in a gentlemanly way at home. So I've exchanged again and again for foreign service, going down and down till I've landed in the West Indies. And now I have this chance of getting back to my old regiment, to a soldier's life that is worth having----"

"No soldier's life is worth having. If you will be kind enough to remember, I objected from the first to the army," interrupted the old man, with icy politeness.

Marmaduke groaned aloud.

"Oh, don't let us go back so far as that, sir. The thing's done, and practically you have to decide now whether you're going to wreck my fortune or make it."

Lord Drummuir took out his pocket-handkerchief solemnly.

"And this is what I am asked to do, when my physicians insist on absolute rest of body and mind. I am asked to consider, to take all the responsibility. No, Marmaduke, you are old enough to decide for yourself!"

"Then you wish me to go back to that miserable hole?" began the young man vehemently.

"I am informed on the best authority that the climate of the West Indies has sensibly improved of late years," remarked his lordship, imperturbably. "The discovery of the cinchona plant----"

"Damn the cinchona plant!" burst out Marmaduke. But at that instant a silvery artificial little laugh rose behind them and Mdlle. Fantine Le Grand appeared tripping over the grass with the daintiest of sandalled feet.

She had again been watching father and son from her window, and after a week's hesitation she had suddenly decided that something must be done to stop what seemed to be growing confidence. She had hitherto played with the plan of arousing the old man's jealousy, confining herself to half-hearted flirtations with Marmaduke, who, also on the watch, had fallen in with the amusement quite pleasantly. But that morning Colonel Compton had spoken out his fears.

"You'll have to look to your p's and q's, Fan, or that youngster will be running away with some of the peer's loose cash. And as the estate is strictly entailed that won't suit us. I overheard that weasel, Jack Jardine, talking to the captain about the purchase of his majority, so you had better look sharp."

The words echoed in her brain as she had stood watching father and son in an apparently amicable conversation which clinched her decision. The result being her appearance before the two conspirators, provocative to the very tilt of her carefully held pink parasol.

"Oh, pardon," she began, in the stage French accent she affected in society, "but I mean not to disturb! Only the filial picture of milor and his too charming son was irresistible to poor me--so sans famille."

She did not look in the least forlorn, and Lord Drummuir's clear, wicked old eyes, that had seen to the bottom of so many evil things, took her in from head to foot, and his clear wicked old brain considered what she would be at. Then he chuckled softly, thinking he had found out.

"No apologies needed, dear little Fan," he said affectionately; "you are almost one of the family already, so we've no secrets. Marmaduke and I were just discussing the purchase of his majority. It will take more than two thousand five hundred pounds, I'm afraid, won't it, dear boy?--what with the regulation and non-regulation figures. A big sum, my dear, a big sum. It will make a hole in what's available for wedding presents, eh, little woman?"

He looked at her with amused malevolence, thinking he had settled her hash; for little Fan was not the woman to flirt with a man who was to do her out of a farthing. And Fantine's eyes were steel as she made a little curtsey.

"Who, my lord," she warbled tenderly, "could regret money spent in such a good cause? Pardon," she added, remembering her accent, "was that not right said? I mean that Marmaduke"--her voice cooed the name--"is welcome to all zat I could give to him."

The baron burst into a huge rough guffaw.

"Come, that is a real good 'un!" he cried, highly amused. "I declare you're as good as a play. But it's not settled yet." Here he glanced at his son, keen to tantalise him too, and with reckless devilry sowing the seeds of evil broadcast. "I shall have to choose between diamonds for my wife and promotion for my son. Meanwhile, my lady, don't get your pretty little feet damp on the grass. Remember you have to dance to us to-night. Ogilvie and all the good fellows for miles round are coming to see you, and you mustn't be a failure."

When the bath-chair and its wheezy occupant had been handed over to the valet, Fantine Le Grand and Marmaduke lingered on the steps together in silence.

"You have not yet seen me dance?" she said, suddenly. "Well, you shall see me this evening! I will dance for you alone, monsieur."

His eyes laughed into hers boldly.

"It is a bargain, mademoiselle; but I shall ask for more, I warn you."

"Dieu merci," she said, with a tiny shrug of her shoulders, "you must not ask too much!"

So with provocative laughter she fled up the steps with the prettiest of little glissades and disappeared, leaving Marmaduke gratified at the impression he had evidently made, and with a certain new admiration for the demure daintiness of Mademoiselle Fantine. His father, devil take him, hadn't a bad taste.

He said nothing of all this, however, to Jack Jardine when he raged for a full hour over his father's absolute lack of human sympathy.

"Why only yesterday," he stormed, "he signed a cheque for one thousand pounds because he wanted to pose as the patron of these dispossessed parsons. It isn't moral, it isn't Christian. He doesn't care if he ruins me body and soul. Anyhow, I've done with him for ever."

"Then you will leave at once?" suggested Jack Jardine.

In truth he was anxious to get the young man away from temptation as soon as possible, and he knew well that in the end he himself would have somehow or another to negotiate the money for the majority.

"No," replied Marmaduke. "I'm going to stop on for a bit."

And he set his nether lip hard. He was not going to give a cheek to the enemy. He meant to hit back if he could. If his father couldn't spare two thousand pounds because he wanted to spend it on a dancing woman, he might find himself in the position of not having the dancing woman on whom to spend it. He, Marmaduke, would have a try at it, anyhow. It was mean and horrible, of course, but so was the old man. He began it.

Peter Muir, coming in yawning, exclaimed at his brother's face.

"What's up, Duke?" he asked. "You look in the devil of a temper."

"So I am," retorted Duke. "And so would you be if you had the spunk to ask anything of the baron. But you haven't, you see."

"Phew!" said Peter. "So you've been attacking the money bags. I could have told you it was no go. That's why I learnt picquet of that Italian count the governor got hold of last year and sent about his business when he had rooked him of a thou! Now I can get a guinea or two off everybody who comes in to the house--except you, Jack. You never will play."

"I don't wish to add to your pocket-money, Peter; you've too much already," replied Jack Jardine sternly. "Ah, I've heard of your beguiling that wretched girl!"

"Not for the first time, old man," put in Peter. "You shouldn't talk about things you don't understand; and a fellow must have some amusement in this cursed hole, especially when the river is low. But for the life of me, Duke, I can't see why you shouldn't go on half pay and stop at home a bit. We should have some fine fun together, and I'd teach you picquet, if you like."

Marmaduke stood gazing at his young brother for a second or two angrily. Then his face softened, he went over to him and laid his hands on his shoulders, and so remained looking down on the weak effeminate face.

"You're talking what they call 'bosh' at school, Peter. You're not a bit content here. How could you be? Give it up and come along with me when I go. The old man doesn't deserve to have a son."

Peter wriggled himself away from his brother's hold.

"I don't really see why you should go."

"Don't you? Well, I'll tell you. Because I'm a soldier born and bred. I don't suppose I shall die on the field of glory, but I shall have a try at it. And I mean to have my majority in my old regiment if I have to forge the old man's name to get it."

With that he gloomed away and loafed about, irritated at all things and everything, even at the preparations that were being made for the festivities of the evening, for these necessitated his being turned out of his comfortable room in order to accommodate some of the guests.

"Where are they putting me?" he asked angrily of Andrew Fraser, whom he found, very long and lank in consequence of repeated attacks of malarial fever, busy packing up his dressing things.

"It will be tae whatten they used to ca' the 'AgÄpemoan' in the old lord's young days, sir," replied Andrew. "Jest yon big room wi' the outside stair in the west wing close to the keep, sir. 'Tis a bonny eneuch room with a fire to it, an' Marrion Paul has ben reddin' it up a' day."

Marrion Paul! The name came as a relief and a regret, for he had not seen her--not anyhow for speech--since their dawn-tide swim together. Now the mere memory of it in its coolness and freshness and beauty calmed his irritation, and half aimlessly he strolled across the quadrangle to inspect his new quarters. She might be there still. Apparently she was, for a sound of determined sweeping came down the stairway.

"Hullo, Marmie, is that you?" he cried joyously, bounding up the steps two at a time.

"Aye, Mr. Duke, it's me," replied the figure with the broom laconically.

Certainly it was a nice comfortable room with the fire blazing and the casement window, still somewhat hung with cobwebs, set wide to the summer sunshine. Marmaduke passed to it and looked out. Beneath him, far down the slanting red cliffs dotted here and there with sombre pines, lay the castle pool, and over yonder to the right were the rocks on the other side where he had found Marmie combing her hair like any mermaid. It was hidden now under a most unbecoming dust kerchief; still the memory was pleasant.

"I say, Marmie," he remarked, "that swim of ours was stunning, wasn't it?"

"It's aye nice in the dawning," replied Marrion comfortably. "I've been out twice since then, and I'm no saying which I enjoyed the maist."

Marmaduke made a wry face.

"You look as if I were interrupting your work," he said tenderly.

"So you are, Captain Duke," she assented calmly. He clapped his hands to his ears in mock alarm, and with a laugh raced headlong downstairs, calling back half-way that 'Andry' would have his work cut out for him getting his master to bed if so be the latter had had a glass too much.

When he had gone Marrion ceased sweeping and rested her cheek on the broom handle for a bit.

He--there was but one he in her life and she faced the fact quietly--did not look so well as he did at first, but of that Andrew Fraser had warned her. He had, in fact, told her of many things which otherwise she would not have known, for she had seen much of him in the last week. The racket of the noisy servants' hall, the whole dissolute life of masters and men up at the castle had not been to his taste, and he had taken to going over to the keep-house for quiet, if not for peace. But even that was coming to him by degrees as he realised the utter hopelessness of his love for Marrion. But he realised also that if she was not for him neither was she for any other man--except one; and that was impossible. So, indeed, he had told her plainly but a day or two before, when half-dazed with fever and ague which had attacked him suddenly, in the keep-house.

She had insisted on his lying down in her grandfather's room, and when she went in to bring him a cup of hot tea he had slipped his feet to the ground apologetically, and sitting up, a lank figure among the blankets, his small pathetic eyes full of fever, had laid a hot hand on hers and said--

"I'll no be troubling you again, Marrion. I canna help loving you and you canna help loving him. It's no oorsels, ye see. It's just Providence; sae we must just both thole it."

She had stood silent, startled by the sudden attack for a second; then she had said gravely--

"Aye, Andry, we must just thole it."

Since then a strange confidence as to Marmaduke's sayings and doings had sprung up between the two, and even at dinner-time that very day he had told of his master's irritability.

"Things have gone ajee," he remarked, "an' I'm thinkin' it's the money for the majority. But what's filthy lucre to health?--and sure as death the captain is no what he was. Gin' it wad make him quit yon bad auld man an' the whore-woman he is takin' to wife, I'd be heart glad."

For Andrew Fraser, being acquainted with his Bible, did not mince words. Neither did Marrion; but having more wits than Andrew she appraised the evils more reasonably, yet with more prejudice. Lord Drummuir was Lord Drummuir, and therefore in a way must be accepted; but the woman was different.

Marrion Paul's eyebrows levelled themselves to a straight bar as she went on with her work.