'Tis but the old, old story,
Yet it ever abideth new;
And to whomsoever it cometh
The heart it breaks in two.'
To leave Revelstoke seemed another wrench.
Dulcie had been born and bred there, and all the villagers in Revelstoke loved and knew Lawyer Carlyon well, and were deeply interested in the future of his daughter; thus, on the day of her departure no one made any pretence of work or working. Heads were popping out and in of the windows of the village street all morning, and a cluster—a veritable crowd—of kindly folks accompanied Mr. Pentreath and the weeping girl to the railway station, for she wept freely at all this display of regard and sympathy, especially from the old, whom she might never see again.
When the train swept her away, and she lost sight of the last familiar feature of her native place, a strange and heavy sense of utter desolation came over poor Dulcie, and but for the presence of other passengers she would have stooped her head upon her hot hands and sobbed aloud, for she thought of her dead parents—when did she not think of them now?
'Oh!' exclaims a writer, 'if those who have loved and gone before us can see afar off those they have left, surely the mother who had passed from earth might tremble now for her child, standing so terribly alone in the midst of a seething sea of danger and temptations?'
CHAPTER XVII.
AT CRAIGENGOWAN.
With the new understanding—the tacit engagement that existed between herself and Vivian Hammersley—Finella writhed with annoyance when privately and pointedly spoken to on the subject of her 'cousin' Shafto's attentions and hopes.
'Grandmamma,' said she to Lady Fettercairn, 'I don't see why I may not marry whom I please. I am not like a poor girl who has nothing in the world. Indeed, in that case I am pretty sure that neither you nor cousin Shafto would want me.'
'She must settle soon,' said Lady Fettercairn, when reporting this plain reply to Lady Drumshoddy. 'I certainly shall not take her to London again, yet awhile.'