"Theodora, no one but G.o.d knows anything about Robert. He would show himself to no one--I mean his real self. Do not judge him on the partial evidence of his sister. She would look no further than his words and actions."

"I wish I had heard nothing about him. I thought he was out of my life forever."

"Do not let the matter disturb you, until you are compelled to. _Grace for the need_ is sure. Nowhere have I seen, _grace before the need_ promised."

"You are right, mother, we will go on with our lives just as if this visit had never happened. I will neither hope nor doubt. I will do my day's work, and leave all with G.o.d."

So the Newton House went back to its calm routine, and Theodora taught and wrote, and helped her mother with her housekeeping, and her father with copying his ma.n.u.scripts, and her boy with his lessons, and the days pa.s.sed into weeks, and the weeks into months, and the promise of Robert's coming became as a dream when one awakeneth.

Yet all was proceeding surely, if leisurely, to the appointed end. In about eight weeks, the Wyntons arrived in London, and following their usual habit delayed and delayed there, for a whole week before starting for Scotland. But once at Wynton Castle, Isabel felt freed from her promise of silence, and she wrote to Robert a few days after her return home, the following note:

"DEAR ROBERT:--We reached home four days ago, and found everything in perfect order. I hope mother and Christina and you yourself are well. I am in fine health, never was better.

When we were in California I came unexpectedly upon Theodora.

We stayed two weeks with her, very pleasant weeks, and if you will come to Wynton as soon as convenient, we shall be glad to see you and tell you all about your wife and child. You need have no anxiety about them. They could not be happier. Give my love and duty to mother, and tell Christina I have a few pretty things for her.

"Your loving sister,

"ISABEL."

Robert found this letter beside his dinner plate, and after he had taken his soup he deliberately opened it. He knew it was Isabel's writing, and the post-marks showed him she was at home again. He knew also that it would contain an invitation to Wynton, and before he was sure of it, he made a vow to himself that he would not go.

"Sir Thomas will prose about the persons and places he has seen, and Isabel will smile and admire him, and I shall have to be congratulatory and say a hundred things I do not want to say. I do not care a farthing for Sir Thomas and his partnership now, and I will not have his patronage." Thus he talked to himself, as he opened the letter, and gave his order for boiled mutton and caper sauce.

When the mutton came he could not taste it. He looked dazed and shocked, and the waiter asked: "Are you ill, sir?"

"Yes," was the answer. "Give me a gla.s.s of wine."

The wine did not help him, and he lifted the letter and went to his room. There he threw himself upon the bed and lay motionless for an hour. He was not thinking, he could not think; he was gathering his forces physical and mental together, to enable him to overcome the shock of Isabel's news, and decide on his future course.

For the information which Isabel had given him in a very prosaic way had shaken the foundations of his life, though he could not for awhile tell whether he regarded it as welcome, or unwelcome. But as he began to recognize its import, and its consequences, his feelings were certainly not those of pleasure, nor even of satisfaction. He had rid himself of all the enc.u.mbrances Theodora had left behind her. He had given his home away and reduced the obligations to his kindred to a minimum, for a visit once a week satisfied his mother and Christina; and if he missed a week, no one complained or asked for the reason. At his club he was well served, all his likes and dislikes were studied and pandered to. There was no quarrelling at the club, no injured wife, no sick child, no troublesome servants. He was leading a life that suited him, why should he change it for Theodora?

If Theodora had been in poverty and suffering, he felt sure he would have had no hesitation, he would have hurried to her side, but a Theodora happy, handsome, and prosperous, was a different problem. Why had she not sent him a letter by Isabel? She must have known, that Isabel would certainly reveal her residence, why then did she not do it herself? "She ought to have written to me," he muttered, "it was her duty, and until she does, I will not take any notice of Isabel's information."

With this determination he fell into an uneasy sleep, and lo, when he awoke, he was in quite a different mood! Theodora, in her most bewitching and pathetic moods, was stirring his memory, and he said softly, yet with an eager pa.s.sion: "I must go where Dora is! I must go to her! I cannot go too quickly! I will see Isabel to-day, and get all necessary information from her."

He found Isabel enthusiastically ready to hasten him. She described the Newton home--its beauty, comfort, peace, and happiness. She went into italics about David--he was a young prince among boys of his age. He rode wondrously, he could do anything with a rifle that a rifle was made for, he was a good English scholar for his age, and was learning Latin and German. She said his grandfather was his tutor, and that the two were hardly ever apart.

At this point Robert had a qualm of jealousy. The boy was _his_ boy, and he ought to be with him, and not with his grandfather. He was defrauded on every side. He said pa.s.sionately, he would go for the boy, and bring him home at any rate; and Isabel told him plainly it could not be done.

"And as for Theodora," she continued, "she looks younger and lovelier than when you married her. You should see her in white lawn with flowers on her breast, or in her wonderful hair; or still better, on horseback, with David riding at her side. Oh, Robert! You never knew the lovely Theodora of to-day."

"If she had any lover," he said slowly, "if she had any lover, you would have discovered that fact, Isabel?"

"Lover! That is nonsense. Her time and interests are taken up with her teaching, writing, and her care of her child. She is educating five girls, daughters of wealthy men living near, and she has published one novel, and is writing another; and she helps Mr. Newton with his ma.n.u.scripts, and Mrs. Newton with her house. She is as busy as she is happy. We stayed two weeks with her, and I saw no one like a lover. I do remember at the hotel where I first saw her, there was a very handsome dark man, who seemed to be on the most friendly, even familiar terms with both Theodora and Mr. Newton. I asked her once who the man was, and she said he was a neighbor, and that she was educating his two daughters. Then I asked if he was likely to call and she told me he had gone to his mine, and that was the reason we had not seen him every day.

She said she was sorry it had so happened, because he would have made our visit much pleasanter."

"No doubt," he answered. "Much pleasanter, of course. Thank you, Isabel.

I owe you more than I can ever pay. I shall go to San Francisco, and see with my own eyes how things are."

"You will see nothing wrong, Robert. Be sure of that. Dora is as good as she is beautiful. I did not love her when I thought her an intruder into my home, but in her own home, she is adorable. Every one loves her."

"I object to every one loving her. She is mine. I am going to bring her to her own home--where she ought to be."

He would not remain to dinner. He was in haste to reach a solitude in which he could commune with his own heart. For Isabel's words had roused a fiery jealousy of his wife, and he had suddenly remembered his mother's first question when she heard of Theodora's flight: "Has she gone with that black-a-visored dandy staying at the Oliphants'?" He had then scornfully denied the supposition--had felt as if it was hardly worth denying. But at this hour, it a.s.sumed an importance that tortured him. His mother had called him black-a-visored, and Isabel had called him dark. The two were the same man, and this conviction came with that infallible a.s.surance, that turns a suspicion into a truth, beyond inquiry or doubt.

He got back to Glasgow--he hardly knew how. He was a little astonished to find himself there. But something, held in abeyance while he was out of the city, returned to him the moment he felt his feet on the wet pavements, and breathed the foggy atmosphere. He knew himself again as Robert Campbell, and with an accented display of his personality went into the discreet, non-observant refuge of his club. He was hungry, and he ate; in a whirl of intense feeling, and he drank to steady himself.

Then he went to see his mother. He wanted a few words with her, about "the black-a-visored dandy."

He found Traquair House topsy-turvy. Christina was giving a dance and there was no privacy anywhere, but in his mother's room. She was dressed for the occasion, and wearing her pearl and diamond ornaments, and he had a moment's surprise and pleasure in her appearance.

"Christina is giving a bit dance," she said apologetically, "and the house is at sixes and sevens. It is the way o' young things. They must turn everything upside down. You look badly, Robert. What's wrong wi'

you?"

"I have found Theodora."

"No wonder you look miserable. Where is she?"

"In California."

"Just the place for the like o' her. It is not past my memory, Robert, when the sc.u.m o' the whole earth was running there. She did right to go where she belongs."

"_Hush_, mother! The Wyntons have been staying with her for two weeks--and they were well entertained. She has a beautiful home, Isabel says."

"Have you seen Isabel?"

"For an hour or two. She sent her love to you."

"She can keep it. If it isn't worth bringing, it isn't worth having."

"Mother, you once spoke to me of a dark man staying at the Oliphants', and asked if Theodora had gone away with him. What made you ask that question?"

"Weel, Robert, she was always flitting quiet-like between this house and the Oliphants'; and twice he walked with her to the top o' the street, and they were a gey long time in holding hands, and saying good-bye."

"Why did you not tell me then?"

"I wanted to let the cutty tak' her run, and to see how far she would go. I had my een on her."

"I feel sure he is living near her, in California."

"Very close, indeed, no doubt o' that--pitying and comforting her. Why don't you do your own pitying?" she asked scornfully.

"I am going to California to-morrow."

"Don't! You'll get yoursel' shot, or tarred and feathered, or maybe lynched. Those West Americans are an unbidable lot; they are a law to themselves, and a very bad law, generally speaking. Bide at hame, and save your life. What for will you go seeking sorrow?"

"I want my son. Isabel says he is a very prince among boys of his age."

"No doubt o' it. There's enough Campbell in him to set him head and shoulders over ordinary lads. But you send men now, that you know where to send them, and let them get the lad away. They'll either coax or carry him."