When John had mounted and was moving away, he looked up to the window where Dorothy stood, and a light came to her eyes and a smile to her face which no man who knows the sum of two and two can ever mistake if he but once sees it.

When I saw the light in Dorothy’s eyes, I knew that all the hatred that was ever born from all the feuds that had ever lived since the quarrelling race of man began its feuds in Eden could not make Dorothy Vernon hate the son of her father’s enemy.

“I was—­was—­watching him draw smoke through the—­the little stick which he holds in his mouth, and—­and blow it out again,” said Dorothy, in explanation of her attitude.  She blushed painfully and continued, “I hope you do not think—­”

“I do not think,” I answered.  “I would not think of thinking.”

“Of course not,” she responded, with a forced smile, as she watched Sir John pass out of sight under the arch of the innyard gate.  I did not think.  I knew.  And the sequel, so full of trouble, soon proved that I was right.  After John had passed through the gate, Dorothy was willing to go home; and when Will Dawson brought the great coach to the inn door, I mounted my horse and rode beside the ladies to Haddon Hall, two miles north from Rowsley.

I shall not stop to tell you of the warm welcome given me by Sir George Vernon, nor of his delight when I briefly told him my misfortunes in Scotland—­misfortunes that had brought me to Haddon Hall.  Nor shall I describe the great boar’s head supper given in my honor, at which there were twenty men who could have put me under the table.  I thought I knew something of the art of drinking, but at that supper I soon found I was a mere tippler compared with these country guzzlers.  At that feast I learned also that Dorothy, when she had hinted concerning Sir George’s excessive drinking, had told the truth.  He, being the host, drank with all his guests.  Near midnight he grew distressingly drunk, talkative, and violent, and when toward morning he was carried from the room by his servants, the company broke up.  Those who could do so reeled home; those who could not walk at all were put to bed by the retainers at Haddon Hall.  I had chosen my bedroom high up in Eagle Tower.  At table I had tried to remain sober.  That, however, was an impossible task, for at the upper end of the hail there was a wrist-ring placed in the wainscoting at a height of ten or twelve inches above the head of an ordinary man, and if he refused to drink as much as the other guests thought he should, his wrist was fastened above his head in the ring, and the liquor which he should have poured down his throat was poured down his sleeve.  Therefore to avoid this species of rustic sport I drank much more than was good for me.  When the feast closed I thought I was sober enough to go to my room unassisted; so I took a candle, and with a great show of self-confidence climbed the spiral stone stairway to the door of my room.