's heart.

The moon was struggling feebly through a ridge of cloud, lighting the
sky at moments like a revolving lamp at sea. On the road home Rotha
passed two young people who were tripping along and laughing as they
went.

"Good night, Rotha," said the young dalesman.

"Good night, dear," said his sweetheart.

Rotha returned the salutations.

"Fine lass that," said the young fellow in a whisper.

"Do you think so? She's too moapy for me," replied his companion. "I
hate moapy folks."

After this slight interruption the two resumed the sport of their good
spirits.

The moon had cleared the clouds now.

It was to be just such a night--save for the frost and wind--as that
fateful one on which Ralph and Rotha walked together from the Red
Lion. How happy that night had seemed to her then to be--happy, at
least, until the end! She had even sung under the moonlight. But her
songs had been truer than she knew--terribly, horribly true.

One lonely foot sounds on the keep,
And that's the warder's tread.

Step by step Rotha retraced every incident of that night's walk; every
word of Ralph's and every tone.

He had told her that her father was innocent, and that he knew it was
so.

He had asked her if she did not love her father, and she had said,
"Better than all the world."

Had that been true, quite _true?_ Rotha stopped and plucked at a bough
in the fence.

When she had asked him the cause of his sadness, when she had hinted
that perhaps he was keeping something behind which might yet take all
the joy out of the glad news that he gave her--what, then, had he
said? He had told her there was nothing to come that need mar her
happiness or disturb her love. Had that also been true, _quite_ true?
No, no, no, neither had been true; but the falsehood had been hers.

She loved her father, yes; but not, no, not better than all the world.
And what had come after had marred her happiness and disturbed her
love. Where lay her love--where?

Rotha stopped again, and as though to catch her breath. Nature within
her seemed at war with itself. It was struggling to tear away a mask
that hid its own face. That mask must soon be plucked aside.

Rotha thought of her betrothal to Willy, and then a cold chill passed
over her.

She walked on until she came under the shadow of the trees beneath
which Angus Ray had met his death. There she paused and looked down.
She could almost conjure up the hour of the finding o