"Edward Barty and I wrote to you, until hope was dead, Austin. Did they all arrive during your fever? The governor has not dared to suppress them."

"The governor dare do a great many things, Eleanor. He dared to run unarmed among eight hundred outcasts for instance. I don't know whether he dare suppress my letters; but I know that he would not, if he dare."

They were much too happy to think about the mystery. They found it all out afterwards. Aunt Maria's maid confessed everything when taxed with it, and threw herself on the ground and prayed for forgiveness, let her hair down, kicked her shoes off, made them a lady's maid's scene about it; and being forgiven, was carried off whooping and plunging, and holding on tight by everything she could get hold of. And after her departure, when old James came back into the room to pick up her shoes and her hair pins, and so on; he looked very much ashamed of himself, and confessed that she, meaning poor Aunt Maria, had been "too many for him."

Robert's statement was this, as far as they could trust it. He said that when he ran off to Namur (he would not go into particulars), Captain Hertford followed him. That he told a friend of

his (Robert Hilton's) to spread a report of his suicide. That his friend met Captain Hertford and told him. That Captain Hertford had without making any further inquiries returned to Brussels. And also that Captain Hertford was uncommon glad not to see him (Robert Hilton) in the dock.

This was all Austin ever got out of him: from this he formed the theory, that there was something "queer," some gambling transaction, or something of that sort, between Robert Hilton and Captain Hertford. He never proved it, and poor Hilton getting more stupid every day, now never told him; but he thought that it was the case. Another thing which puzzled Austin was this, did Captain Hertford ever really believe that Robert Hilton was dead? That puzzle was never solved either.

Eleanor's statement was this: Captain Hertford had returned from abroad and brought the news of her brother's death at Namur. Aunt Maria introduced him as an old friend. She had seen him a good deal from that time (summer of 1844) until October, 1845. Then one day he came and told them not only that her brother was alive, but that he was in Millbank for swindling. That Lord Mewstone was a most vindictive man, and that the secret of Robert

Hilton's existence should be kept from him. He was very vindictive about that forgery for instance.

Eleanor and Austin, when they came to think about it, were of opinion that Captain Hertford was very anxious that Robert Hilton should not appear in the dock in the matter of the Mewstone forgery. They may have done him an injustice, they never made out anything clearly against him here.

Eleanor, hearing this terrible news, determined that her brother should be free and out of the way, before she consented to marry Austin. It would have been such a death-blow to all his high hopes, to marry a convict's sister. She kept the secret from

him out of mere love and consideration for him. No one knew the secret but Aunt Maria, Eleanor, old James, and Captain Hertford. She used to go and visit the poor fellow once a month, on the fifteenth of each month; and Hertford, who seems to have pitied her at one time, sometimes went; it was on returning from one of these expeditions that Austin met her, holding Captain Hertford's arm.

Yes, everything was explained. The black cloud had passed suddenly, and beyond lay the prospect of the future, glorious and golden; peaceful beneath the calm summer's sun.

CHAPTER XIX.

WHEN Austin left Ronaldsay in May, 1845, the potatoes were just coming out of the ground, and the women and children, in the lengthening spring evenings, were weeding them, and opening the earth between the rows, and regarding them complacently. The rich dark green leaves were showing handsomely above the dark ground. It made one's heart swell with thankfulness, to see the noble promise of a harvest. The old wives no longer knitted, looking towards the sea, where the good man and brave young sons and husbands were toiling at their weary fishing, but they took their knitting into the potato yard, and watched here how the plants came on. And little Ronald, and little Donald, and little Elsie, and little May, gave over paddling at the pier-end, and came home and weeded the potatoes, and made

believe that they were sorting the lilies and roses in the MacTavish's grand garden, at Glen Stora Castle, away yonder in Argyleshire.

Sweet summer settled down upon the island. The old folks had ease from their chronic rheumatism; the young men stayed late on the quay, and the young women stayed with them. Elspeth, the beauty of the island, did not bring the cows home by herself now; when she came down the glen there was always some one with her:

"A voice talked with her 'neath the shadows cool
More sweet to her than song."

The potatoes throve bravely. Before you were prepared for it, the plants were a foot high, covered with purple and white blossom. And the children gathered them; the purple ones were my Leddy MacTavish's roses, and the white ones were the lilies which the Saints in heaven carried in their hands before the Throne, ye ken.

It was a pleasant summer, and the potato harvest promised bravely. For years the island had not been so merry; there was but one anxious face on it, and that was Mr. Monroe's. He had been warned of something, which the others knew not of. Night