'What is about to happen? When will old Fettercairn return, and in what mood? What the devil is up—perhaps by this time?' thought Shafto, as he resumed his solitary promenade. 'I would rather face a hundred perils in the light of day, than have one, with a nameless dread, overhanging me in the dark.'
And as he muttered and thought of Madelon Galbraith, his shifty eyes gleamed with that savage expression which comes with a thirst for blood.
Meanwhile Lord Fettercairn, a man of strict honour in his own way, though utterly destitute of proper patriotism or love of country, was being swept on to Edinburgh by an express train; he was full of bitter thoughts, vexation, pain, even grief and shame, for all that Shafto was evidently bringing upon his house and home.
He had secured, he thought, an heir to his ill-gotten title and estates, and with that knowledge would ever have to drain the bitter cup of disappointment to the dregs.
Finella never doubted that, owing to their great mutual regard, Dulcie would write to her, and tell of her own welfare, safety, and prospects; but weary, long, and solitary days passed on and became weeks, and Dulcie never did so. She had perhaps nothing pleasant to relate of herself, and thus the tenor or spirit of her letters to a friend so rich might be liable to misconstruction. If written, perhaps they were intercepted. So, regarding Shafto and Lady Fettercairn as the mutual cause of the poor girl's flight, and perhaps destruction, Finella now resolved to leave Craigengowan, and go on a visit to her maternal grandmother, Lady Drumshoddy, then in London, when that matron, having now her favourite nephew with her, began to mature some schemes of her own; but carefully, as she had read that 'the number of marriages that come to nothing annually because one or other or both of the innocent victims suddenly discover they are being thrown together with intention, is inconceivable.'
CHAPTER XI.
THE PURSUIT OF CETEWAYO.
Mail after mail came to head-quarters, brought by post-carts and orderlies, from the rear, but they brought no letters from Dulcie Carlyon. So, whether she had, as she threatened she would do, fled from Craigengowan, or remained there, found friends elsewhere with happiness or grief, Florian could not know, and the doubt was a source of torment to him.
Horseback has been considered a famous place for reflection, but one could scarcely find it so when serving as a Mounted Infantry-man, scouting on the outlook for lurking Zulus, with every energy of ear and eye watching donga, boulder, bush, and tuft of reedy grass.
Sir Garnet Wolseley's orders to the army reached the camp of Lord Chelmsford at Entonjaneni on the 8th July, and the latter prepared at once to resign his command and return home.