Donal took no wine during dinner,
the earl as before took very little, and lady Arctura none. She
listened respectfully to her uncle's talk, and was attentive when
Donal spoke; he thought she looked even sympathetic two or three
times; and once he caught the expression as of anxiety he had seen
on her face that same day twice before. It was strange, too, he
thought, that, not seeing her sometimes for a week together, he
should thus meet her three times in one day. When the last of the
dinner was removed and the wine placed on the table, Donal thought
his lordship looked as if he expected his niece to go; but she kept
her place. He asked her which wine she would have, but she declined
any. He filled his glass, and pushed the decanter to Donal. He too
filled his glass, and drank slowly.
The talk revived. But Donal could not help fancying that the eyes of
the lady now and then sought his with a sort of question in
them--almost as if she feared something was going to happen to him.
He attributed this to her having heard that he took too much wine
the night before. The situation was unpleasant. He must, however,
brave it out! When he refused a second glass, which the earl by no
means pressed, he thought he saw her look relieved; but more than
once thereafter he saw, or fancied he saw her glance at him with
that expression of slight anxiety.
In its course the talk fell upon sheep, and Donal was relating some
of his experiences with them and their dogs, greatly interested in
the subject; when all at once, just as before, something seemed to
burst in his head, and immediately, although he knew he was sitting
at table with the earl and lady Arctura, he was uncertain whether he
was not at the same time upon the side of a lonely hill, closed in a
magic night of high summer, his woolly and hairy friends lying all
about him, and a light glimmering faintly on the heather a little
way off, which he knew for the flame that marks for a moment the
footstep of an angel, when he touches ever so lightly the solid
earth.
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