The Knight seized the young man's arm, and led him along as he spoke. “Nay,” said he, “there is another reason for it. If you suffered me to go off alone, nothing would make me believe that what I have now heard was not some strange trick of fancy. Here, with you beside me, feeling your arm within my own, and hearing your voice, it is all that I can do to believe it. Come, let me be convinced again. Where did you join us?”
Forester now went over the whole story of his late adventures, omitting nothing from the moment he had joined the frigate at Portsmouth to the last evening, when as a prisoner, he had sent for Darcy to speak to him before he died. “I thought then,” said he, “I could scarcely have more than an hour or two to live; but when you came and stood beside me, I was not able to utter a word, I believe, at the time. It was rather a relief to me than otherwise that you did not know me.”
“How strange is this all!” said the Knight, musing. “You have told me a most singular story; only one point remains yet unelucidated. How came you to volunteer,—you were in the Guards?”
“Yes,” said Forester, blushing and faltering; “I had quitted the Guards, intending to leave the army, some short time previous; but—but—”
“The thought of active service brought you back again. Out with it, and never be ashamed. I remember now having heard from an old friend of mine, Miss Daly, how you had left the service; and, to say truth, I was sorry for it,—sorry for your sake, but sorrier because it always grieves me when men of gentle blood are not to be found where hard knocks are going. None ever distinguish themselves with more honor, and it is a pity that they should lose the occasion to show the world that birth and blood inherit higher privileges than stars and titles.”
While the miles rolled over, they thus conversed; and as each became more intimately acquainted and more nearly interested in the other, they drew towards the journey's end. It was late on the following night when they reached Port Ballintray; and as the darkness threatened more than once to mislead them, the postilion halted at the door of a little cabin to procure a light for his lamps.
While the travellers sat patiently awaiting the necessary preparation, a voice from within the cottage struck Darcy's ear; he threw open the door as he heard it, and sprang out, and rushing forward, the moment afterwards pressed his wife and daughter in his arms.
Forester, who in a moment comprehended the discovery, hastened to withdraw from a scene where his presence could only prove a constraint, and leaving a message to say that he had gone to the little inn and would wait on the Knight next morning, he hurried from the spot, his heart bursting with many a conflicting emotion.