William, his whole soul in his eyes, was gazing at Mr. Ashley. He could not tell whether he might believe what he heard; whether he was awake or dreaming.
"Did I deliver you a message from Henry?"
"No, sir," was the abstracted response.
"He wants you to go over to him. I said I would send you if you were not busy. He is not very well to-day."
"But—Mr. Ashley—did you mean what you said?"
"Should I have said it had I not meant it?" was the quiet answer. "Have you a difficulty in believing it?"
The ingenuous light rose to William's eyes, as he raised them to his master's. "I have no money," he whispered. "I cannot settle a farthing upon her."
"You have something better than money, William—worth. And I can make settlements. Go and hear what Mary says. You will catch the half-past three o'clock coach, if you make haste."
William went out, believing still that he must be in a trance. His deeply buried dream of the long past years: was it about, indeed, to become reality?
But in the midst of it he could not help casting a thought to a less pleasing subject—the Dares. Herbert was young to die; he was, no doubt, unprepared to die; and William sincerely hoped that the report would prove untrue. The Dares were going down sadly in the social scale; Cyril especially. He was just what Captain Chambers had called him—a scamp. After leaving Mr. Ashley's, he had entered his father's office; as a temporary thing, it was said; but he had never left it for anything else. A great deal of his time was passed in public-houses. George, whose commission never came, had gone out, some two or three years ago, to Sydney. His sister Julia and her husband had settled there, and they had found an opening for George. William walked on, thinking of the Dares' position and of his own.