Red Ratcliffe moved away, sullenly, with a bridle in either hand, and found his grandfather leaning heavily against the door-post of the stable.
"Thou'lt have to groom the three of them," said Nicholas, in a failing voice. "That cursed fire has—has tapped my strength a little." He stood upright with a plain effort, and frowned on his grandson, and, "Lad," he said, "what wast saying to Janet just now? I gave thee free leave to win her if thou could'st—but, by the Living Heart, there shall none force her inclination."
"Ay, shall there," muttered the younger man, as he watched Nicholas turn on his heel and falter toward the house. "Red Ratcliffe shall force her inclination, when she hears how much he knows of her meetings with Shameless Wayne; were the Lean Man once to guess, he'd set finger and thumb to Janet's throat, I think, and crush the life out of her, though she's dear as his sword-hand to him.—Peste! How he staggers in the doorway. What if he has got his death-blow down there at Marsh? 'Twill be an ill hour for us when we go leaderless.—The devil's in the wind to-night; it seems to whistle a burial-song," he broke off, gloomily setting himself to rub down the horses.
But the Lean Man, as if bent on refuting his grandson's fears, was down betimes on the morrow. His face and hands were not good to see now that daylight showed each scar on them; but he had regained the most part of his strength, and he ate like one who sees long life before him.
"Where's Janet?" he asked, when breakfast was half through. "Oh, there thou art, child. What ails thee to come down so late, when thou know'st I need thee as a sauce to every meal?"
All through the night her pity had been for those at Marsh;
but now, as her eyes met and shrank from the Lean Man's scars, as she heard the tenderness of voice which none but she could win from him, the girl came and laid a compassionate hand on his shoulder. "I slept all amiss, sir," she said, "through—through troubling for what chanced last night."
"Well, sit thee down, girl, and never trouble thy head again about so small a matter.—Small? Nay!" he cried with his old power of voice as he glanced round the board. "See these scars, lads—don't fear to take a straight look at them. We're loosening our hold on the Wayne-hate, and these should stiffen you. A scar for a scar; and he that kills Shameless Wayne, by trickery or open fight, shall——"
He paused, searching for some reward that should seem great enough and Red Ratcliffe broke suddenly into the talk.
"Shall have Janet there in marriage," he cried.