A little sob broke from the mother’s lips.  It was the bitterest thought of all to the parents; and yet they could not see wherein they had erred.  They had striven to bring up the boy well.  He had had the same training as his father before him.  There had been no lack of firmness, and no lack of love, but the result, as at present seen, was terrible to the father and mother.

The squire heard the stifled sound of grief, and put out his hand to clasp that of his wife.

“Remember he is the child of many prayers,” he said.  “We must believe that those prayers will be answered.  We must have faith in God.”

“I will try—­I will try,” answered the poor mother; “but oh, my husband, how shall I hope to cope with that wild spirit when you are gone?”

It was a hard question to answer, for the Squire himself had found his son more than a match for him many a time.  It was true that he had done all that man can do to protect wife and daughter from the reckless extravagance of an ungoverned nature; but he knew well that Tom was not one to see himself tamely set aside.  There were difficulties ahead for these two women, and the future of his son lay like a load upon his spirit.

“I would speak with Tom,” he said, after a brief pause, during which Rachel administered a draught of the cordial which did most to support the failing strength of the dying man.  Just at this moment the lamp of life seemed to be glowing with fresh strength.  It was but the last flicker before extinction, and the wife knew it, but Rachel experienced a glow of hope that perhaps it might mean a temporary improvement.

“I will go and see if he has come,” she said.  “Perchance they have found and brought him by now.”

She glided from the room, just giving one backward glance in so doing, when the expression on her mother’s face brought a quick spasm of pain to her heart.  There was a strange conflict of feeling going on within her, as she trod the corridor with swift steps, and passed rapidly down into the hall beneath.

This hall was a great square place, with a glowing fire illuminating it, the dancing shadows falling grotesquely upon the pictured Tuftons that lined the walls, and upon the weapons which hung, together with trophies of game, between them.  In the centre of the hall was an oak table, heavily carved about the legs, and at this table stood a tall, broad-shouldered young man, clad in the stout leathern breeches and full coat of the period, tossing off a steaming tankard of some spirituous liquor, although the flush on his face, and the slightly unsteady way in which he held the vessel, seemed to indicate that he stood in no further need of strong drink.

Rachel came swiftly down the staircase, her footfall making scarcely any sound upon the shallow polished steps.

“Tom!” she exclaimed, in a voice full of repressed feeling, “how can you delay drinking here, when your father upstairs is dying, and is asking for you?”