"Oh, Bessie?" said Gell (he looked a little confused) "Bessie's all right, I think. But there's trouble coming in that quarter, I'm afraid."
"What trouble?"
"As we were walking along Langness yesterday—I went down to tell her about the Deemster—we met Cæsar Qualtrough coming from the farm."
"Qualtrough?"
"You know—father of the young scoundrel who got us into that scrape at King William's."
"I remember."
"He's a friend of Dan Baldromma's, and Dan is a tenant of my father's and .... But good Lord, what matter! I've worse things than that to worry about."
As Gell was going out of the gate, the night was falling and the stars were out, and he was saying to himself, "Does he really care for the girl, or is it only a sense of duty?"
And Stowell, as he closed the door and went back into the house (empty and vault-like now, as a house is on the first night after the being who has been the soul of it has been left outside) was thinking, "I can't allow Alick to be my scapegoat any longer."
But at the next moment he was thinking of Fenella. With mingled shame and joy he was asking himself what was being thought of the incident in the churchyard—by Fenella herself, by the Governor, by everybody.