"Le vent qui vient à travers la montagne M'a rendu fou!" VICTOR HUGO.
It was half an hour past midnight. Sir Philip was left in absolute solitude to enjoy his meditative stroll on deck, for the full radiance of light that streamed over the sea and land was too clear and brilliant to necessitate the attendance of any of the sailors for the purpose of guarding the Eulalie. She was safely anchored and distinctly visible to all boats or fishing craft crossing the Fjord, so that unless a sudden gale should blow, which did not seem probable in the present state of the weather, there was nothing for the men to do that need deprive them of their lawful repose. Errington paced up and down slowly, his yachting shoes making no noise, even as they left no scratch on the spotless white deck, that shone in the night sunshine like polished silver. The Fjord was very calm,--on one side it gleamed like a pool of golden oil in which the outline of the Eulalie was precisely traced, her delicate masts and spars and drooping flag being drawn in black lines on the yellow water as though with a finely pointed pencil. There was a curious light in the western sky; a thick bank of clouds, dusky brown in color, were swept together and piled one above the other in mountainous ridges, that rose up perpendicularly from the very edge of the sea-line, while over their dark summits a glimpse of the sun, like a giant's eye, looked forth, darting dazzling descending rays through the sullen smoke-like masses, tinging them with metallic green and copper hues as brilliant and shifting as the bristling points of lifted spears. Away to the south, a solitary wreath of purple vapor floated slowly as though lost from some great mountain height; and through its faint, half disguising veil the pale moon peered sorrowfully, like a dying prisoner lamenting joy long past, but unforgotten.
A solemn silence reigned; and Errington, watching sea and sky, grew more and more absorbed and serious. The scornful words of the proud old Olaf Güldmar rankled in his mind and stung him. "An idle trifler with time--an aimless wanderer!" Bitter, but, after all, true! He looked back on his life with a feeling kin to contempt. What had he done that was at all worth doing? He had seen to the proper management of his estates,--well! any one with a grain of self-respect and love of independence would do the same. He had travelled and amused himself,--he had studied languages and literature,--he had made many friends; but after all said and done, the bonde's cutting observations had described him correctly enough. The do-nothing, care-nothing tendency, common to the very wealthy in this age, had crept upon him unconsciously; the easy, cool, indifferent nonchalance common to men of his class and breeding was habitual with him, and he had never thought it worth while to exert his dormant abilities. Why then, should he now begin to think it was time to reform all this,--to rouse himself to an effort,--to gain for himself some honor, some distinction, some renown that should mark him out as different to other men? why was he suddenly seized with an insatiate desire to be something more than a mere "mushroom knight, a fungus of nobility"--why? if not to make himself worthy of--ah! There he had struck a suggestive key-note! Worthy of what? of whom? There was no one in all the world, excepting perhaps Lorimer, who cared what became of Sir Philip Errington, Baronet, in the future, so long as he would, for the present, entertain and feast his numerous acquaintances and give them all the advantages, social and political, his wealth could so easily obtain. Then why, in the name of well-bred indolence, should he muse with such persistent gloom, on his general unworthiness at this particular moment? Was it because this Norwegian maiden's grand blue eyes had met his with such beautiful trust and candor?