o you as long as I can,' she said tenderly.

Brother and sister then emerged by the heavy door into the drive. The
feeling and aspect of the hour were precisely similar to those under
which the steward had left the house the evening previous, excepting
that apparently unearthly reversal of natural sequence, which is caused
by the world getting lighter instead of darker. 'The tearful glimmer of
the languid dawn' was just sufficient to reveal to them the melancholy
red leaves, lying thickly in the channels by the roadside, ever and anon
loudly tapped on by heavy drops of water, which the boughs above had
collected from the foggy air.

They passed the Old House, engaged in a deep conversation, and had
proceeded about twenty yards by a cross route, in the direction of the
turnpike road, when the form of a woman emerged from the porch of the
building.

She was wrapped in a grey waterproof cloak, the hood of which was drawn
over her head and closely round her face--so closely that her eyes were
the sole features uncovered.

With this one exception of her appearance there, the most perfect
stillness and silence pervaded the steward's residence from basement to
chimney. Not a shutter was open; not a twine of smoke came forth.

Underneath the ivy-covered gateway she stood still and listened for two,
or possibly three minutes, till she became conscious of others in the
park. Seeing the pair she stepped back, with the apparent intention
of letting them pass out of sight, and evidently wishing to avoid
observation. But looking at her watch, and returning it rapidly to her
pocket, as if surprised at the lateness of the hour, she hurried out
again, and across the park by a still more oblique line than that traced
by Owen and his sister.

These in the meantime had got into the road, and were walking along it
as the woman came up on the other side of the boundary hedge, looking
for a gate or stile, by which she, too, might get off the grass upon the
hard ground.

Their conversation, of which every word was clear and distinct, in the
still air of the dawn, to the distance of a quarter of a mile, reached
her ears, and withdrew her attention from all other matters and sights
whatsoever. Thus arrested she stood for an instant as precisely in the
attitude of Imogen by the cave of Belarius, as if she had studied the
position from the play. When they had advanced a few steps, she followed
them in some doubt, still screened by the hedg