“Don't say that, Tony, for I remember my father saying, in one of his letters, that he met Sir Arthur at the fair of Ballymena, and that he said, 'If you should see Tony, doctor, tell him I 'm hunting for him everywhere, for I have to buy some young stock. If I do it without Tony Butler's advice, I shall have the whole family upon me.'”
“That's easy enough to understand. I was very useful and they were very kind; but I fancy that each of us got tired of his part.”
“They were stanch and good friends to you, Tony. I 'm sorry you 've given them up,” said she, sorrowfully.
“What if it was they that gave me up? I mean, what if I found the conditions upon which I went there were such as I could not stoop to? Don't ask me any more about it; I have never let a word about it escape my lips, and I am ashamed now to hear myself talk of it.”
“Even to me, Tony,—to sister Dolly?”
“That's true; so you are my dear, dear sister,” said he, and he stooped and kissed her forehead; “and you shall hear it all, and how it happened.”
Tony began his narrative of that passage with Mark Lyle with which our reader is already acquainted, little noticing that to the deep scarlet that at first suffused Dolly's cheeks, a leaden pallor had succeeded, and that she lay with half-closed eyes, in utter unconsciousness of what he was saying.
“This, of course,” said Tony, as his story flowed on,—“this, of course, was more than I could bear, so I hurried home, not quite clear what was best to be done. I had n't you, Dolly, to consult, you know;” he looked down as he said this, and saw that a great tear lay on her cheek, and that she seemed fainting. “Dolly, my dear,—my own dear Dolly,” whispered he, “are you ill,—are you faint?”
“Lay my head back against the wall,” sighed she, in a weak voice; “it's passing off.”