'I—I mean, that is——'
'Who or what the devil do you mean, Mr. Sharpe?' said Roland, undeterred by the pressure of Maude's little hand on his arm.
'I mean that Mrs. Lindsay, acting on my advice, has no intention of doing so.'
'Why?' asked Roland, dissembling his rage, to find the mask thrown off thus.
'Because the land is worth twice as much again as it was in the days when your grandfather gave a tack of the Mains to his grandfather.'
'Surely he deserves to benefit thereby?'
'We don't think so.'
'We again!' thought Roland, trembling with suppressed passion; but now Trotter, the servant, announced that the gamekeeper wished to see Mr. Sharpe, and Gavin Fowler was ushered in—an old man whose eyes, when Roland shook hands with him, glistened with pride and pleasure, as he exclaimed:
'Welcome back to your father's rooftree and yer ain fireside, sir; a' here hae lang wanted ye sairly.'
A sneer hovered on the lips of Hawkey Sharpe, as he said briefly to the keeper, who had a gun under his arm, a shot-belt over his shoulders, and a couple of dogs at his heels: