‘Thank you, mother, the letter is finished,’ I replied as I sealed it up, ‘and will be sent.  Good-bye, dear,’ I said, taking her hand and kissing it.  ’You knew not what you did, and I know you did it for the best.’

‘When do you return, Henry?’ asked she, in a conquered and sad tone, that caused me many a pang to remember afterwards.

‘That is altogether uncertain,’ I answered.  ’I go to follow Winifred.  If I find her alive I shall marry her, if she will marry me, unless permanent insanity prove a barrier.  If she is dead’—­(I restrained myself from saying aloud what I said to myself)—­’I shall still follow her.’

‘The daughter of the scoundrel!’ she murmured, her lips grey with suppressed passion.

‘Mother,’ I said, ’let us not part in anger.  The sword of Fate is between us.  When I was at school I made a certain vow.  The vow was that I would woo and win but one woman upon earth—­the daughter of the man who has since violated my father’s tomb.  I have lately made a second vow, that, until she is found, I shall devote my life to the quest of Winifred Wynne.  If you think that I am likely to be deterred by fears of being disinherited by your family, open and read my letter to my uncle.  I have there told him whom I intend to marry.’

‘Mad, mad boy!’ said my mother.  ‘Society will—­’

’You have once or twice before mentioned society, mother.  If I find Winifred Wynne, I shall assuredly marry her, unless prevented by the one obstacle I have mentioned.  If I marry her I shall, if it so please me and her, take her into society.’

‘Into society!’ she replied, with ineffable scorn.

‘And I shall say to society, “Here is my wife.’”

‘And when society asks, “Who is your wife?’”

’I shall reply, “She is the daughter of the drunken organist who desecrated my father’s tomb, though that concerns you not:—­her own speciality, as you see, is that she is the flower of all girlhood."’

‘And when society rejects this earthly paragon?’

‘Then I shall reject society.’

‘Reject society, boy!’ said my mother.  ’Why, Cyril Aylwin himself, the bohemian painter who has done his best to cheapen and vulgarise our name, is not a more reckless, lawless leveller than you.  And, good heavens! to him, and perhaps afterwards to you, will come—­the coronet.’

And she left the room.

III

WINIFRED’S DUKKERIPEN

I

I need not describe my journey to North Wales.  On reaching Bettws y Coed I turned into the hotel there—­’The Royal Oak’—­famished; for, as fast as trains could carry me, I had travelled right across England, leaving rest and meals to chance.  I found the hotel full of English painters, whom the fine summer had attracted thither as usual.  The landlord got me a bed in the village.  A six-o’clock