"The devil's as bright in your eyes still, Maud, as it was when you won
poor Jack Roupall's heart, and then jilted him for a rich husband. I did
not think any one would have found me out."
"If I did sell myself," replied the landlady, "I have had my
reward"--the colour faded from her cheek as she spoke--"as all will have
who go the same gait. But ye ken, Bobby, it was not for my ain sake, but
that my poor mother might have a home in her auld age--and so she had,
and sure that ought to make me content." The tears gathered in her eyes,
and the Ranger loudly reproached himself for unkindness, and assured her
he meant no harm.
"I am sure o' that; but when any one evens Jack to me, it brings back
the thought of my ain North to my heart, and its words to my tongue,
which is no good now, as it becomes me to forget both."
"God bless you, Maud!" said Robin, shaking her affectionately by the
hand: "God bless you! and if any ask after the Ironsides, see you say
nothing of the young gentleman, who is as dear to me as my heart's
blood; and do not tell to any, even of our own set, that I passed this
way; for it's hard to tell who's who, or what's what, these times."
"So it is," replied the dame, smiling through tears; "and now God be wi'
ye, Robin!" And presently he heard her voice carolling a North country
ballad, as she returned to her own house.
"Now is her heart in her own country," muttered the Ranger, "though her
voice is here; and those who did not know her little story would think
her as cheerful as the length of a summer's day; and so she ought to be,
for she performed her duty; and duty, after all, when well performed,
seems a perpetual and most cheerful recompense for care and toil, and,
it may be, trouble of mind and pain of heart."
Robin having obtained the clue to the secret of which he was in search,
wended his way towards the metropolis. The steeples of a hundred
churches were soon in sight.