Lucy at once followed him through the house, through the deep porch to the court, which was shaded by a noble walnut-tree, where Sir Marmaduke loved to sit among his dogs.  There not sat Berenger, resting against the trunk, overcome by the heat and exertion of his ride.  His cloak and hat lay on the ground; the dogs fawned round him, eager for the wonted caress, and his three little sisters stood a little aloof, clinging to one another and crying piteously.

It was their first sight of him; and it seemed to them as if he were behind a frightful mask.  Even Lucy was not without a sensation of the kind, of this effect in the change from the girlish, rosy complexion to extreme paleness, on which was visible, in ghastly red and purple, the great scar left by Narcisse, from the temple on the one side to the ear on the other.

The far more serious would on the cheek was covered with a black patch, and the hair had almost entirely disappeared from the head, only a few light brown locks still hanging round the neck and temples, so that the bald brow gave a strange look of age; and the disfigurement was terrible, enhanced as it was by the wasting effect of nearly a year of sickness.  Lucy was so much shocked, that she could hardly steady her voice to chide the children for not giving a better welcome to their brother.  They would have clung round her, but she shook them off, and sent Annora in haste for her mother’s fan; while Philip arriving with a slice of diet-bread and a cup of sack, the one fanned him, and the other fed him with morsels of the cake soaked in the wine, till he revived, looked up with eyes that were unchanged, and thanked them with a few faltering words, scarcely intelligible to Lucy.  The little girls came nearer, and curiously regarded him but when he held out his hand to his favourite Dolly, she shrank back in reluctance.

‘Do not chide her,’ he said wearily.  ’May she never become used to such marks!’

‘What, would you have her live among cowards?’ exclaimed Philip; but Berenger, instead of answering, looked up at the front of the house, one of those fine Tudor facades that seem all carved timber and glass lattice, and asked, so abruptly that Lucy doubted whether she heard him alright,—­’How many windows are there in this front?’

‘I never counted,’ said Philip.

‘I have,’ said Annora; ’there are seven and thirty, besides the two little ones in the porch.’

‘None shall make them afraid,’ he muttered.  ’Who would dare build such a defenceless house over yonder?’—­pointing south.

‘Our hearts are guarded now,’ said Philip, proudly.  Berenger half smiled, as he was wont to do when he meant more than he could conveniently utter, and presently he asked, in the same languid, musing tone, ‘Lucy, were you ever really affrighted?’

Lucy questioned whether he could be really in his right mind, as if the bewilderment of his brain was again returning; and while she paused, Annora exclaimed, ’Yes, when we were gathering cowslips, and the brindled cow ran at us, and Lucy could not run because she had Dolly in her arm.  Oh! we were frightened then, till you came, brother.’