his passions, and they were calm; then he forced himself to arrange
some plan for the future.

He had not, in the passionate hurry of the moment, seen that his
father had left the cottage before he was aware of the fatal accident
that befell the child. Owen thought he had seen all; and once he
planned to go to the Squire and tell him of the anguish of heart he
had wrought, and awe him, as it were, by the dignity of grief. But
then again he durst not--he distrusted his self-control--the old
prophecy rose up in its horror--he dreaded his doom.

At last he determined to leave his father for ever; to take Nest to
some distant country where she might forget her firstborn, and where
he himself might gain a livelihood by his own exertions.

But when he tried to descend to the various little arrangements which
were involved in the execution of this plan, he remembered that all
his money (and in this respect Squire Griffiths was no niggard) was
locked up in his escritoire at Bodowen. In vain he tried to do away
with this matter-of-fact difficulty; go to Bodowen he must: and his
only hope--nay his determination--was to avoid his father.

He rose and took a by-path to Bodowen. The house looked even more
gloomy and desolate than usual in the heavy down-pouring rain, yet
Owen gazed on it with something of regret--for sorrowful as his days
in it had been, he was about to leave it for many many years, if not
for ever. He entered by a side door opening into a passage that led
to his own room, where he kept his books, his guns, his fishing-
tackle, his writing materials, et cetera.