"Not a whit, Dick," replied the old nobleman. "The favours of fortune, or, as some would call them better, the gifts of God, are loans, my dear boy, to be resumed when it is His pleasure; and--"
"Then I have borrowed them long enough," interrupted Richard Newark, in his abrupt way; "and it is high time they should be restored."
"No, no, Dick," said Lord Newark. "They are yours since your father's death. I have nought to do with them, and could not enjoy them even if you gave them up."
"They are not mine at all," replied the young man, "never have been mine, never have been my father's."
"But the forfeiture, the forfeiture!" exclaimed Lord Newark. "If they are not yours, whose are they?"
"Emmeline's," replied her cousin. "The forfeiture extended not to her. They were settled by deed upon your dear lady and her children, male and female, two years before the forfeiture. You lost them by drawing the sword against King William. She lost them, and your sons lost them, by accompanying you in the war and in your flight. You four are specially named in the act of attainder; and the lands fell to her at once as the next heir. The cunning lawyers, I believe, outwitted themselves by making the black and white parchment so particular; but the original act, always preserved by my father, was found by Van Noost when he went down to patch up an old monument in Aleton church by putting a leaden hand on a stone figure. I was always sure there was something of the kind, or my father would not have kept such a sharp watch upon Emmy. He was not a man to keep pet birds in a cage for the sole purpose of feeding them and hearing them sing. God rest his soul! He did it all for me; and so I must say no more."
Lord Eskdale looked to Emmeline, with a thoughtful enquiring glance; and she read his meaning in an instant.
"I will not take them, Dick," she said. "I cannot, will not, take them from you. Am I not right, Henry?"
"But you must, sweet lady," replied Richard. "With what is left, I have enough, and more than enough; so that you do not make me pay back all that has been unjustly taken. The lands were conveyed to my father by gift of the crown, saving the appearance of any nearer heir not named in the act of forfeiture. The lands are yours therefore, and ever have been yours. I will have nothing to do with them. I tell you, dear cousin, I have enough, and far more than enough, for a single man."
"But you may marry, Richard," said Emmeline. "You are very young to make vows of celibacy."