ime or attention free, it might have been noted by a
keen observer that Lady Gertrude had added to her personal attendants
one who looked like a tall and stout woman, though her hood was so
closely drawn that her face was seen by none of the warders, who,
however, let her pass unchallenged: for she rode beside her mistress,
and was evidently in the position of a trusted companion; for the lady
was speaking to her as they passed out through the gate, and there could
certainly be no reason for offering any obstruction to any servant of hers.

If there were any fear or excitement in Gertrude's breast as she and her
husband passed out of the gate and rode quickly along the path which led
through the town, she did not betray it by look or gesture. Her
eagerness was mainly showed by a desire to push on northward as fast as
possible, and the light of a full harvest moon made travelling almost as
easy as by day. On they rode, by sleeping hamlets and dreaming pastures,
until the lights of Windsor lay twinkling in the dim, hazy distance
miles away.

Then Gertrude suddenly threw back her hood, and leaning towards her
companion -- they two had outridden their followers some time before --
cried in a strange, tense voice:

"O Wendot husband, thou art free! Tomorrow will see us safe within those
halls of which thou art rightful lord. Captivity, trouble, peril is at
an end. Nothing can greatly hurt us now, for are we not one in bonds
that no man may dissever?"

"My noble, true-hearted wife," said Wendot, in accents of intense
feeling; and then he leaned forward and kissed her in the whispering
wood, and they rode forward through the glades of silvery moonlight
towards the new life that was awaiting them beyond.

"Hills, wild rocks, woods, and water!" cried Wendot, with a sudden
kindling gleam in his eyes. "O Gertrude, thou didst not tell me the
half! I never guessed that England had aught so like home as this. Truly
it might be Dynevor itself -- that brawling torrent, those craggy fells,
and these gray stone walls. And to be free -- free to breathe the fresh
wind, to go where the fancy prompts, to be loosed from all control save
the sweet bonds that thou boldest me in, dearest! Ah, my wife, thou
knowest not what thou hast done for me. How shall I thank thee for the
boon?"

"Why, by being thine old self again, Vychan," said Gertrude, who was
standing by her husband's side on a natural terrace of rock above the
Hall which was to