"Carsluith proposed to drive you both home. Can you not wait until he is ready?" she suggested.
"I fear I cannot," answered Dane, with a trace of confusion. "The fact is, I have an appointment to keep."
He left them a trifle abruptly, and Miss Maxwell turned to Lilian.
"Whom can your guest have an appointment with? He looked positively guilty. I fear that he must have fallen into the toils of some rustic beauty, which, considering his opportunities, shows a deplorably defective taste."
If Lilian felt any resentment she showed no sign of it; but she was a little more quiet than usual while they awaited the return of Carsluith Maxwell.
Dane, remembering Lilian's glance of interrogation, hurried toward the Hallows Brig in a somewhat uncertain humor. Though the hillside was still projected blackly against a pale gleam of saffron above, it was nearly but not quite dark when he reached the bridge, and the water sang mournfully through the deepening gloom of the firs. The cool air was fragrant with the faint sweetness of honeysuckle, and the calling of curlew rose from a misty meadow; and it seemed to Dane that the slight, shadowy figure which presently flitted toward him was in keeping with the spirit of the scene. When the girl halted beside him there was still just sufficient light to show that her face was comely. Hilton Dane was not given to wandering fancies, and had long carried Lilian Chatterton's photograph about with him; but he felt compassionate when he saw the anxiety in the thin face, and noticed that the girl's lips were quivering.
"Miss Johnstone, I presume?" he said. "Will you please tell me why you sent for me?"
"I will try, sir," was the answer. "I have two little sisters to bring up on what I earn by my needle, and what Jim can spare; but work has been ill to get at the quarries, and, now when Jim's in prison, and winter's no far away, I'm afraid to wonder what will be the outcome if he is convicted."
"He should have considered such risks before he attempted to steal another man's partridges," said Dane, with a poor attempt at severity.
"Poaching is not stealing, sir!" There was a ring in the girl's voice. "Sorrow on the game that steals the farmer's corn to make a rich man's pleasure, and tempts a poor man to his ruin! May ye never learn, sir, what it is to choose between stealing and starving."