"When I go away I shall leave my fortune and my title behind me. Shall I leave anything else? Yes, everything else. Maud.
"If I leave my fortune and my title and Maud behind me, what do I take with me?
"Nothing worth the carriage.
"Bounteous God, I thank Thee with all my heart, and all my soul, and all the faculties of my nature, for having given love to man, and having given me to love!"
The evening of the day Grey had visited the Island after his return from London, the two cousins sat alone in the little drawing-room after dinner.
"Maud, will you take great care of yourself while I am away?" he asked very earnestly.
She was sitting by a small ebony table in front of the fire. He reclined in an easy-chair at the opposite side of the grate.
She looked up with a childish amused smile, and answered:
"Yes; I will try and take care of myself while you are away. This is a very safe place to live in. No one can get near us without a boat, and everyone knows that a farmer's house would be better for thieves than Island Castle."
"And yet, Maud, though no man come, something very precious might be stolen by a thief while I am away." He spoke gravely, with that old far-away look in his eyes.