"Your Highness will remember," he ventured to suggest, "that these Galloway squires are apt to carry the vendetta rather far. They are not so easily bought off with a title as others farther south."
"Nonsense," said the Duke, "if the girl's father does not see reason--why, Julian Wemyss at least knows what is good for his niece. She had better be a peeress in her own right and married with the left hand to my father's son, than stay here to spend her life with the first clodhopper who will make her his housekeeper, instead of, what she was born to be, the toast of London society."
"You are sure about the title," queried my Lord Wargrove cynically, "or are you only going to promise like the rest of them?"
"Oh," said the Duke, "I am sure George owes me more than that. I am the only one of our family who has never pestered him. Besides, I have got him out of one or two difficult ditches in his life, and he will give me the title right enough if I get the girl."
"There will be some difficulty," said my Lord, thoughtfully rubbing his chin with his forefinger; "we shall have to depend on our own devices. The only great land-owner about here is old De Raincy up at the castle yonder. He hates the Ferrises like poison, but I do not see myself going up there and asking for the loan of his best horses in order to carry off his enemy's daughter! A nice clean murder he might not object to as a fitting finish to the Ferris line, but not what your Royal Highness proposes to himself."
"All that is for you to arrange--what else are you for? You are my Master of the Horse, and as I have none at present, it is your business to provide some for me! Now good-night to you--I must see that girl again to-morrow. Gad, when I once get her safe to Lyonesse House, she shall wear the cross-gartered sandals, the blue skirt with the red sash, and if London does not bow down and worship, I am no true son of my father."
But the next day Patsy was still absent, greatly to the annoyance of the Duke. He had counted on a difficult but not unwilling captive. He judged from her easy familiarity in the matter of the wool-winding that he would have little difficulty in persuading her to make a dash for the liberty which would also be glory.
