ng slowly, heedless
of where their footsteps led them; heedless, too, of being seen by any
of the keepers who, at night, usually patrolled the estate. Their walk,
however, lay at the farther end of the glen, in the coverts remote from
the house and nearer the high-road; therefore there was but little
danger of being observed.

Many were the pledges of affection they exchanged before parting. On
Walter's part they were fervent and passionate, but on the part of his
idol they were, alas! only the pretence of a happiness which she feared
could never be permanent.

Presently they retraced their steps to the edge of the wood beyond which
lay the house. They found the path, and there, at her request, he left
her. It was not wise that he should approach the house at that hour, she
urged.

So, after a long and fervent leave-taking, he held her in a last
embrace, and then, raising his cap, and saying, "Good-night, my darling,
my own well-beloved!" he turned away and went at a swinging pace down
the farm-road where he had left his car with lights extinguished.

She watched him disappear. Then, sighing, she turned into the dark,
winding path beneath the trees, the end of which came out upon the drive
close to the house.

Half-way down, however, with sudden resolve, she took a narrower path to
the left, and was soon on the outskirts of the wood and out again in the
bright moonlight.

The night was so glorious that she had resolved to stroll alone, to
think and devise some plan for the future. Before her, silhouetted high
against the steely sky, rose the two great, black, ivy-clad towers of
the ancient castle. The grim, crumbling walls stood dark and frowning
amid the fairy-like scene, while from far below came up the faint
rippling of the Ruthven Water. A great owl flapped lazily from the ivy
as she approached those historic old walls which in bygone days had held
within them some of Scotland's greatest men. She had explored and knew
every nook and cranny in those extensive ruins. With Walter's
assistance, she had once made a perilous ascent to the top of the
highest of the two square towers, and had often clambered along the
broken walls of the keep or descended into those strange little
subterranean chambers, now half-choked with earth and rubbish, which
tradition declared were the dungeons in which prisoners in the old days
had been put to the rack, seared with red-hot irons, or submitted to
other horrible tortures.

H