'I HAVE gained something,' he cried aloud. 'I understand it now--at
least I think I do. What if, in fighting for the truth as men say,
the doors of a man's own heart should at length fly open for her
entrance! What if the understanding of that which is uttered
concerning her, be a sign that she herself draweth nigh! Then I will
go on.--And that I may go on, I must recover my mare.'
Honestly, however, he could not quite justify the scheme. All the
efforts of his imagination, as he rode home, to bring his judgment
to the same side with itself, had failed, and he had been driven to
confess the project a foolhardy one. But, on the other hand, had he
not had a leading thitherward? Whence else the sudden conviction
that Scudamore had taken her, and the burning desire to seek her in
Raglan stables? And had he not heard mighty arguments from the lips
of the most favoured preachers in the army for an unquestioning
compliance with leadings? Nay, had he not had more than a leading?
Was it not a sign to encourage him, even a pledge of happy result,
that, within an hour of it, and in consequence of his first step in
partial compliance with it, he had come upon the only creature
capable of conducting him into the robber's hold? And had he not at
the same time learned the Raglan password?--He WOULD go.
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