“I am quite sure a day or two won’t make any difference,” said he, quickly.  “In any case we were not thinking of going till Monday, and that would only mean an extra day.”

“Very well,” Macleod said.

“Then you will come down to dinner on the Monday evening.  I will see if there is no alteration in the trains, and drop you a note with full instructions.  Is it a bargain?”

“It is.”

“All right.  I must be off now.  Good-by.”

Major Stuart jumped to his feet with great alacrity, and warmly shook hands with the departing stranger.  Then, when the door was shut, he went through a pantomimic expression of bringing down innumerable pheasants from every corner of the ceiling—­with an occasional aim at the floor, where an imaginary hare was scurrying by.

“Macleod.  Macleod,” said he, “you are a trump.  You may go on writing love-letters from now till next Monday afternoon.  I suppose we will have a good dinner, too?”

“Beauregard is said to have the best chef in London; and I don’t suppose they would leave so important a person in Ireland.”

“You have my gratitude, Macleod—­eternal, sincere, unbounded,” the major said, seriously.

“But it is not I who am asking you to go and massacre a lot of pheasants,” said Macleod; and he spoke rather absently, for he was thinking of the probable mood in which he would go down to Weatherill.  One of a generous gladness and joy, the outward expression of an eager and secret happiness to be known by none?  Or what if there were no red rose at all on her bosom when she advanced to meet him with sad eyes?

They went down into Essex next day.  Major Stuart was surprised to find that his companion talked not so much about the price of machines for drying saturated crops as about the conjectural cost of living in the various houses they saw from afar, set amidst the leafless trees of November.

“You don’t think of coming to live in England, do you?” said he.

“No—­at least, not at present,” Macleod said.  “Of course; one never knows what may turn up.  I don’t propose to live at Dare all my life.”

“Your wife might want to live in England,” the major said, coolly.

Macleod started and stared.

“You have been writing a good many letters of late,” said his companion.

“And is that all?” said Macleod, answering him in the Gaelic.  “You know the proverb—­Tossing the head will not make the boat row.  I am not married yet.”

The result of this journey was, that they agreed to purchase one of the machines for transference to the rainy regions of Mull; and then they returned to London.  This was on Wednesday.  Major Stuart considered they had a few days to idle by before the battue; Macleod was only excitedly aware that Thursday and Friday—­two short November days—­came between him and that decision which he regarded with an anxious joy.