She at last took compassion on him, and in the evening, when it was now too late for a sail to Inch Coombe, she herself recommended a walk to him.
The poor boy's feet took him toward Newhaven, not that he meant to go to his love, but he could not forbear from looking at the place which held her.
He was about to return, when a spacious blue jacket hailed him.
Somewhere inside this jacket was Master Flucker, who had returned in the yacht, leaving his sister on the island.
Gatty instantly poured out a flood of questions.
The baddish boy reciprocated fluency.

He informed him "that his sister had been the star of a goodly company, and that, her own lad having stayed away, she had condescended to make a conquest of the skipper himself.
"He had come in quite at the tag-end of one of her stories, but it had been sufficient to do his business--he had danced with her, had even whistled while she sung.

(Hech, it was bonny!) "And when the cutter sailed, he, Flucker, had seen her perched on a rock, like a mermaid, watching their progress, which had been slow, because the skipper, infatuated with so sudden a passion, had made a series of ungrammatical tacks." "For his part he was glad," said the gracious Flucker; "the lass was a prideful hussy, that had given some twenty lads a sore heart and him many a sore back; and he hoped his skipper, with whom he naturally identified himself rather than with his sister, would avenge the male sex upon her." In short, he went upon this tack till he drove poor Gatty nearly mad.
Here was a new feeling superadded; at first he felt injured, but on reflection what cause of complaint had he?
He had neglected her; he might have been her partner--he had left her to find one where she could.
Fool, to suppose that so beautiful a creature would ever be neglected--except by him! It was more than he could bear.
He determined to see her, to ask her forgiveness, to tell her everything, to beg her to decide, and, for his part, he would abide by her decision.
Christie Johnstone, as we have already related, declined his arm, sprang like a deer upon the pier, and walked toward her home, a quarter of a mile distant.
Gatty followed her, disconsolately, hardly knowing what to do.
At last, observing that she drew near enough to the wall to allow room for another on the causeway, he had just nous enough to creep alongside and pull her sleeve somewhat timidly.
"Christie, I want to speak to you:" "What can ye hae to say till me ?" "Christie, I am very unhappy; and I want to tell you why, but I have hardly the strength or the courage." "Ye shall come ben my hoose if ye are unhappy, and we'll hear your story; come away." He had never been admitted into her house before.
They found it clean as a snowdrift.
They found a bright fire, and Flucker frying innumerable steaks.
The baddish boy had obtained them in his sister's name and at her expense, at the flesher's, and claimed credit for his affection.
Potatoes he had boiled in their jackets, and so skillfully, that those jackets hung by a thread.
Christie laid an unbleached table-cloth, that somehow looked sweeter than a white one, as brown bread is sweeter than white.
But lo! Gatty could not eat; so then Christie would not, because he refused her cheer.
The baddish boy chuckled, and addressed himself to the nice brown steaks with their rich gravy.
On such occasions a solo on the knife and fork seemed better than a trio to the gracious Flucker.
Christie moved about the room, doing little household matters; Gatty's eye followed her.
Her beauty lost nothing in this small apartment; she was here, like a brilliant in some quaint, rough setting, which all earth's jewelers should despise, and all its poets admire, and it should show off the stone and not itself.
Her beauty filled the room, and almost made the spectators ill.
Gatty asked himself whether he could really have been such a fool as to think of giving up so peerless a creature.
Suddenly an idea occurred to him, a bright one, and not inconsistent with a true artist's character--he would decline to act in so doubtful a case.

He would float passively down the tide of events--he would neither desert her, nor disobey his mother; he would take everything as it came, and to begin, as he was there, he would for the present say nothing but what he felt, and what he felt was that he loved her.
He told her so accordingly.
She replied, concealing her satisfaction, "that, if he liked her, he would not have refused to eat when she asked him." But our hero's appetite had returned with his change of purpose, and he instantly volunteered to give the required proof of affection.
Accordingly two pound of steaks fell before him.

Poor boy, he had hardly eaten a genuine meal for a week past.
Christie sat opposite him, and every time he looked off his plate he saw her rich blue eyes dwelling on him.
Everything contributed to warm his heart, he yielded to the spell, he became contented, happy, gay.
Flucker ginger-cordialed him, his sister bewitched him.
She related the day's events in a merry mood.
Mr.Gatty burst forth into singing.
He sung two light and somber trifles, such as in the present day are deemed generally encouraging to spirits, and particularly in accordance with the sentiment of supper--they were about Death and Ivy Green.
The dog's voice was not very powerful, but sweet and round as honey dropping from the comb.
His two hearers were entranced, for the creature sang with an inspiration good singers dare not indulge.
He concluded by informing Christie that the ivy was symbolical of her, and the oak prefigured Charles Gatty, Esq.
He might have inverted the simile with more truth.
In short, he never said a word to Christie about parting with her, but several about being buried in the same grave with her, sixty years hence, for which the spot he selected was Westminster Abbey.
And away he went, leaving golden opinions behind him.
The next day Christie was so affected with his conduct, coming as it did after an apparent coolness, that she conquered her bashfulness and called on the "vile count," and with some blushes and hesitation inquired, "Whether a painter lad was a fit subject of charity." "Why not ?" said his lordship.
She told him Gatty's case, and he instantly promised to see that artist's pictures, particularly an "awfu' bonny ane;" the hero of which she described as an English minister blessing the bairns with one hand, and giving orders to kill the puir Scoetch with the other.
"C'est e'gal," said Christie in Scotch, "it's awfu' bonny." Gatty reached home late; his mother had retired to rest.
But the next morning she drew from him what had happened, and then ensued another of those dialogues which I am ashamed again to give the reader.
Suffice it to say, that she once more prevailed, though with far greater difficulty; time was to be given him to unsew a connection which he could not cut asunder, and he, with tearful eyes and a heavy heart, agreed to take some step the very first opportunity.
This concession was hardly out of his mouth, ere his mother made him kneel down and bestowed her blessing upon him.
He received it coldly and dully, and expressed a languid hope it might prove a charm to save him from despair; and sad, bitter, and dejected, forced himself to sit down and work on the picture that was to meet his unrelenting creditor's demand.
He was working on his picture, and his mother, with her needle, at the table, when a knock was heard, and gay as a lark, and fresh as the dew on the shamrock, Christie Johnstone stood in person in the apartment.
She was evidently the bearer of good tidings; but, before she could express them, Mrs.Gatty beckoned her son aside, and announcing, "she should be within hearing," bade him take the occasion that so happily presented itself, and make the first step.
At another time, Christie, who had learned from Jean the arrival of Mrs.
Gatty, would have been struck with the old lady's silence; but she came to tell the depressed painter that the charitable viscount was about to visit him and his picture; and she was so full of the good fortune likely to ensue, that she was neglectful of minor considerations.
It so happened, however, that certain interruptions prevented her from ever delivering herself of the news in question.
First, Gatty himself came to her, and, casting uneasy glances at the door by which his mother had just gone out, said: "Christie!" "My lad!" "I want to paint your likeness." This was for a _souvenir,_ poor fellow! "Hech! I wad like fine to be painted." "It must be exactly the same size as yourself, and so like you, that, should we be parted, I may seem not to be quite alone in the world." Here he was obliged to turn his head away.
"But we'll no pairt," replied Christie, cheerfully.