inquire too closely into her father's life.

The years had gone on and then had come the happy visit to Loyland
Towers, where she had met Dyck Calhoun. Her life at that moment had been
free from troublesome emotions; but since the time she had met Dyck at
the top of the hill, a new set of feelings worked in her.

She was as bonny a lass as ever the old world produced--lithe, with a
body like that of a boy, strong and pleasant of face, with a haunting
beauty in the eyes, a majesty of the neck and chin, and a carriage which
had made Michael Clones call her a queen.

She saw Dyck only as, a happy, wild son of the hilltop. To her he was a
man of mettle and worth, and irresponsible because he had been given no
responsibility. He was a country gentleman of Ireland, with all the
interest and peril of the life of a country gentleman.

"Yes, we ought to go to Dublin, mother. We could help him, perhaps,"
Sheila insisted.

The mother shook her head mournfully.

"My child, we could do him no good at all--none whatever. Besides, I
can't afford to visit Dublin now. It's an expensive journey, and the
repairs we've been doing here have run me close."

A look of indignation, almost of scorn, came into the girl's face.

"Well, if I were being tried for my life, as Dyck Calhoun is going to be,
and if I knew that friends of mine were standing off because of a few