lter with the slightest thought of affection. She loved him with
the whole strength of her being. During that twelve long months of
absence he had been daily in her thoughts, and his constant letters she
had read and re-read dozens of times. She had, since she left school,
met many eligible young men at houses to which her mother had grudgingly
taken her--young men who had been nice to her, flattered her, and
flirted with her. But she had treated them all with coquettish disdain,
for in the world there was but one man who was her lover and her
hero--her old friend Walter Murie.

At this moment, as they were together in that cosy, well-furnished room,
she became seized by a twinge of conscience. She knew quite well that
she was not treating him as she ought. She had not been at all
enthusiastic at his return, and she had inquired but little about his
wanderings. Indeed, she had treated him with a studied indifference, as
though his life concerned her but little. And yet if he only knew the
truth, she thought; if he could only see that that cool, unresponsive
attitude was forced upon her by circumstances; if he could only know how
quickly her heart throbbed when he was present, and how dull and lonely
all became when he was absent!

She loved him. Ah, yes! as truly and devotedly as he loved her. But
between them there had fallen a dark, grim shadow--one which, at all
hazards and by every subterfuge, she must endeavour to hide. She loved
him, and could, therefore, never bear to hear his bitter reproaches or
to witness his grief. He worshipped her. Would that he did not, she
thought. She must hide her secret from him as she was hiding it from all
the world.

He was speaking. She answered him calmly yet mechanically. He wondered
what strange thoughts were concealed beneath those clear, wide-open,
child-like eyes which he was trying in vain to fathom. What would he
have thought had he known the terrible truth: that she had calmly, and
after long reflection, resolved to court death--death by her own
hand--rather than face the exposure with which she had that previous
night been threatened.

CHAPTER VII

CONTAINS CURIOUS CONFIDENCES

A week had gone by. Stewart, the lean, thin-faced head-keeper, who spoke
with such a strong accent that guests from the South often failed to
understand him, and who never seemed to sleep, so vigilant was he over
the Glencardine shootings, had reported the purchase of a couple of new
po