“I neither want to see nor hear,” cried Lily. “Let me pass; you need have no fear of me.”
At the voice Helen came quietly out of his shadow. “You need not hide me from Lily,” she said, “for Lily is my dear friend. I’ve walked far, far from home, Lily, with one that—one that—I may never see again,” she said, turning a pathetic look upon the man by her side. “He blames me now, and perhaps I am to be blamed. But to think it is, maybe, the last time, as he is telling me, breaks my heart. Lily, will you take us in, if it was only for half-an-hour? I feel as if I could not go on another step, for my heart fails me as well as my feet.”
“You never told me you were wearied, Helen!” he cried in a tone of fierce penitence. “How was I to know? I could have carried you like a feather.”
She shook her head. “You could carry more weight than me, Alick, but as soon Schiehallion as me. And I was not wearied till I saw rest at hand.”
“Miss Ramsay,” he said, “you know what she and I are to each other.”
“I know nothing,” cried Lily, “and you need not tell me, for what Helen does is always right; but come in and welcome, and have your talk out in peace. Never mind to explain to me—I scarcely know your name.”
“It is, alas, no credit, or rather I am no credit to a good name that has been well kept on this countryside; but we are old, old friends, Helen Blythe and me. She should have been my wife, Miss Ramsay, though you might not think it, nearly ten long years ago. If she had kept her promise, they would never have called me wild Alick Duff, and the black sheep of the family, as they do now. This is the third time I’ve come back to bid her keep her word; for I have her word, rough and careless as you may think me. Each time I’m less worth taking than I was the time before, and I’m not going to risk it any more. When she drops me this time, I will just go to the devil, which is the easiest way, and trouble nobody more about me.”
“And why should you go to the devil?” said Lily, “for that is what nobody except your own self can make you do.”
“Oh, do not hearken to him, Lily; let us come in for half-an-hour, for neither will my feet carry me nor will my heart hold me up if there is more.”
Lily made her guests enter before her when they reached the door of Dalrugas; but lingering behind as Helen made her way slowly with her tired steps up the spiral stairs, caught Duff by the sleeve and spoke in his ear: “Do you not think shame of yourself to break her heart, a little thing like that, with putting the weight of your ill deeds upon her, and you a big strong man?”