'I'm afraid she does care for Angus,' he said.
'As much as he cares for her, I believe,' replied Dick. 'Just think,' he added bitterly, 'that these two people love each other for the best that is in them, one of the rarest things in life, and are nevertheless to be kept apart. Look here.'
Dick drew aside his blind, and pointed to a light cast on the opposite wall from a higher window.
'That is Angus's light,' he said. 'On such a night as this, when he is not wanted at the Wire, you will see that light blazing into the morning. Watch that moving shadow; it is the reflection of his arm as he sits there writing, writing, writing with nothing to write for, and only despair to face him when he stops. Is it not too bad?'
'They will forget each other in time,' said the colonel. 'Let Dowton have another chance. He is to be at the Lodge.'
'But if they don't forget each other; if Dowton fails again, and Mary continues to eat her heart in silence, what then?'
'We shall see.'
'Look here, father. I cannot play this pitiful part before Angus for ever. Let us make a bargain. Dowton gets a second chance; if he does not succeed, it is Angus's turn. Do you promise me so much?'
'I cannot say,' replied the colonel thoughtfully. 'It may come to that.'
Rob was as late in retiring to rest that night as Dick had predicted, but he wrote less than usual. He had something to think of as he paced his room, for, unlike her father and brother, he knew that when Mary was a romantic schoolgirl she had dressed the sham baronet, as a child may dress her doll, in the virtues of a hero. He shuddered to think of her humiliation should she ever hear the true story of Josephs—as she never did. Yet many a lady of high degree has given her heart to a baronet who was better fitted to be a barber.