On the whole, it was scarcely what Paul would have expected to amuse him, and yet, after ten years of a land where hay-fields are not, and it is unsafe to sit about for fear of snakes, it was strangely pleasant. And so delightfully innocent! This came home to him one night when, on going to his room, he saw his purse on the dressing-table, and remembered that for a whole week he had not opened it. The world had gone on as if there were no such thing in it as money. He mentioned the fact next day among the hay-cocks, declaring that if someone would only be responsible for his bills, he himself would never care to see a shilling again.
"Not I," said Will, rather dolefully; "for I'm afraid, Gleneira, these masons and carpenters will cost a lot more than we fancied. It is always the way when one touches a place. I remember when Inveresta began he told me I wasn't to exceed a thousand, and before he was half way through his list of absolute necessaries, the figures had passed fifteen hundred. And yet I don't think it can be helped."
He blew disconsolately at his pipe as if it were in fault, for he prided himself on managing the estates in his charge with strict economy, but Paul smiled indifferently.
"My owner will be able to pay, I expect, when I get one. For when the worst comes to the worst, Miss Carmichael, I can always put myself up to auction. Do you think I should fetch a fair price? Item, one Highland estate, seriously damaged by the Crofter Commission, and an ancestral tree, ditto, by Darwinism. N.B.--Property encumbered by several mortgages and one extravagant proprietor." He lay back against a hay-cock with his hands behind his head, looking the personification of lazy content as he watched her face shift and change. "You don't seem to approve of my plan," he went on, in the same light tones, "but the idea has infinite charm for me; it would save so much trouble, and do so little harm. People sell themselves to the devil, we are told, and that may be reprehensible--at any rate, it would be uncomfortable. But what inconvenience or immorality can there be in making yourself over, soul and body, to some virtuous Christian man or woman who, in all probability, is far more capable of running the coach respectably than you are?"
"The same immorality as there is in any other form of suicide, I suppose," she replied coldly; but he was not to be put off.
"And what immorality is there in suicide, Miss Carmichael? I hold that my life is my own, unless I make over the responsibility of it to someone else, which you say is wrong. Therefore, I have a perfect right to do what I please with it."
"Once you have overcome the initial difficulty of discovering what you do please," she retorted sharply. And he smiled.
"You use a detective camera apparently, but I admit it. I am only certain of one thing, it pleases me to please myself. It pleases me now to forget that there is such a thing as money, and to go to bed at ten o'clock."
"Which shows that you are virtuously inclined, and that, therefore----"
"I refuse to be whitewashed by your charity," he interrupted. "I am of the earth, earthy; though sometimes I can lie on my back in the hay and see heaven opening----" His voice, with a sudden cadence in it, ceased as he sprang lightly to his feet.