"Don't talk so much. You are exhausting yourself."
Hardwick took a second drink of brandy, and as the heart quickened he began to look more like his old self. "I am all right now," he assured his helper, "I can manage to crawl to my lodgings and lie down for a time." He got on to his feet and stretched himself languidly. "I always carry brandy on the chance of these attacks!"
"You couldn't have used the brandy had I not been here to help you," said the Squire bluntly. "If you are liable to such seizures you should not venture to wander on these lonely moors by yourself."
"Perhaps not! But it is rarely I become so incapable. Thank you very much for being so kind. I shall go home now."
Then Enistor made an effort which rather amazed himself. "Let me take you home, Hardwick. You are not fit to go by yourself."
Hardwick was as amazed as the man who made this offer. "I didn't think you would bother about me in that way," he said weakly: then he straightened himself with an effort. "Thank you all the same, but I can manage!" And giving his preserver a friendly handshake, he moved along the path which meandered towards Polwellin.
The Squire stood looking after him, thinking that he might fall again and require further assistance. But the tall figure moved steadily through the mists, apparently possessed of sufficient vital power to reach the haven of home in safety. Then the Squire thoughtfully resumed his way to Don Pablo's cottage, wondering at the discovery he had made. Hardwick looked so strong and well, and was so massive and imposing in appearance, that no one could possibly have guessed that his heart was weak. But Enistor did not wonder at this alone: he wondered also at his own kind offer to go out of his way to help any one in distress. It was rather a weak thing to do, he reflected, and not at all an action of which Narvaez would approve. All the same Enistor resolved to tell the Spaniard if only for his own glorification.
Don Pablo was seated by a huge fire in his sinister study, with a paper in his hands covered with odd signs and hieroglyphics. With his usual serenity he murmured a welcome and pointed to a chair. But he did not speak further for the moment and Enistor employed the time in trying to read the inscrutable face, which was seamed with a thousand wrinkles and made quite inhuman by the passionless look of the cold, steady, blue eyes. Shortly the old man laid the paper aside with a sigh of satisfaction.
"What are you doing?" asked Enistor curiously.