y dear friend as truly as if it had been her hand
that dealt the blow. He was shot in the Tower court below here,
with his back to the wall, by a company of soldiers. And, as I now
believe, it was Eleanor Carey who in some way met the King, and
kept him from us on that day.

"I tell you all this that you may believe, in spite of all you may
have seen that day at Chichester, Eleanor Carey is not the woman I
love. You did not believe this at Ripon House. Margaret, will you
believe it now?

"Yours, forever,

"GEOFFREY RIPON."

"Fifteen years!" said Maggie, meditatively, after she had read the
letter, with varying waves of white and red in her face, not unremarked
by Reynolds, as he stood with his hat in his two hands.

"Fifteen years! Papa!"

The door of an adjoining room opened, and Mr. Windsor appeared.

"Yes, my dear."

"Papa, this is Mr. Reynolds."

"Mr. Reynolds, I am very happy to make your acquaintance."

"Mr. Reynolds was Lord Brompton's servant--at Ripon, you remember?"

"Oh! Reynolds, I am glad to see you."

"That will do, Reynolds; you can go."

"Papa, I have a commission for you in England."

Reynolds's face fell. "Any--any message for my master, my lady?"

"No. Oh--stop--yes. You may tell him," said Maggie, with a heightened
color, smiling, "you may tell him I am about to be married."

CHAPTER XV.

LOVE LAUGHS AT LOCKSMITHS.

In the centre of its wide waste of barren hills, huge granite
outcroppings and swampy valleys, the gloomy prison of Dartmoor stood
wrapped in mist one dismal morning in the March following the Royalist
outbreak. Its two centuries of unloved existence in the midst of a wild
land and fitful climate had seared every wall-tower and gateway with
lines and patches of decay and discoloration. Originally built of brown
stone, the years had deepened the tint almost to blackness in the larger
stretches of outer wall and unwindowed gable.

On this morning the dark walls dripped with the weeping atmosphere, and
the voice of the huge prison bell in the main yard sounded distant and
strange like a storm-bell in a fog at sea.

Through the thick drizzle of the early morning the convicts were marched
in gangs to their daily tasks, some to build new walls within the prison
precincts, some to break stone in the round yard, encircled by enormous
iron railings fifteen