oulder. She stood for a moment at the
closed window, then opened it and looked out. The night was cold and
dark; but she braved it, and sat humming a tune, her hand playing with
the ivy that crept up to the window-sill.

The air was one I knew. Many a time had she crooned it in the old days
as I rowed her in the boat. Once, on a specially happy evening, she had
sung it in the attic on the Quai Necker in Paris, and had laughed when I
put in a rough bass.

I could not help, as I stood and listened, repeating the experiment,
first very softly, then less so, and finally loud enough for her to
hear.

What fools we men are! At that instant, with a savage howl, a dog--my
own dog Con--rushed down the garden to the spot. The window closed
abruptly; there was a sound of voices in the yard and a drawing of bolts
at the hall-door, and a hurrying of lights within. I had barely time to
cast off from the stake by which I held, and let my boat into the rapid
ebb, when footsteps sounded on the gravel, and a shot fired into the
night woke the echoes of the lough.

So much for my serenading, and so much for the life of security and
peace my little mistress was doomed to live in her father's house.

I cared not much where the tide took me after that, till presently the
tossing of my boat warned me that I must be on the reef off Kilgorman
cliffs. In the darkness I could see nothing, but my memory was strong
enough to serve for moon and compass both. On this tide and with this
wind ten minutes would bring me into the creek.

Why not? Why not now as well as any other time? I was a man, and
feared ghosts no longer. Love had been warned away from Knockowen; duty
should welcome me at Kilgorman. So I put down my helm, let out my
sheet, commended myself to my Maker, and made for the black rocks.

I was determined to avoid the creek and make for the house by the narrow
cave which, as I had discovered at my last visit, led up from the shore
to the great hearth in the kitchen of the house, and which, as it then
seemed, was a secret passage known only to his honour and the smugglers
in his employ. It needed some groping about in the dark to find the
ledge of rock behind which was the small crack in the cliff that marked
the entrance; but I hit on it after a little, and, shoving through,
found myself inside the cave. I moored my boat beside the rocky ledge,
and then clambered up to the entrance of the narrow gallery. Once there