now I think it right to pay Lady Ellinor the respect of repairing, as
well as I can, the havoc three sleepless nights have made on the
exterior of a gentleman who is on the shady side of remorseless forty."

Lord Castleton here left me, and I wrote to my father, begging him to
meet us at the next stage (which was the nearest point from the high
road to the Tower), and I sent off the letter by a messenger on
horseback. That task done, I leaned my head upon my hand, and a
profound sadness settled upon me, despite all my efforts to face the
future and think only of the duties of life--not its sorrows.




CHAPTER IV.


Before nine o'clock Lady Ellinor arrived, and went straight into Miss
Trevanion's room; I took refuge in my uncle's. Roland was awake and
calm, but so feeble that he made no effort to rise; and it was his calm,
indeed, that alarmed me the most,--it was like the calm of nature
thoroughly exhausted. He obeyed me mechanically, as a patient takes
from your hand the draught, of which he is almost unconscious, when I
pressed him to take food. He smiled on me faintly when I spoke to him,
but made me a sign that seemed to implore silence. Then he turned his
face from me and buried it in the pillow; and I thought that he slept
again, when, raising himself a little, and feeling for my hand, he said,
in a scarcely audible voice,--

"Where is he?"