An unco heavy black leather bag, sir, that was a'."

"How do you know the bag was heavy?"

"By the way she lugged it, sir. The porter offered to relieve her o' it,
but she wad na trust it out o' her hand ae minute."

"Ah! Was it a large bag?"

"Na, sir, no that large, but unco heavy, as it might be filled fu' o'
minerals, the like of whilk the college lads whiles collect in the
mountains. Na, it was no' large, but unco heavy, and she wad na let it
out o' her hand ae minute."

"Just so. Would you know that young woman again if you were to see her?"

"Na, I could na see her face. She wore a thick, dark vail, doublit over
and over her face, the whilk was the moir to be noticed because the nicht
was sae warm."

"You say her face was concealed. How, then, did you know her to be a
young woman?"

"Ou, by her form and her gait just, and by her speech."

"She talked with you, then?"

"Na, she spak just three words when she handed in the money for her
ticket: 'One--second-class--through.'"

"Would you recognize her voice again if you should hear it?"

"Ay, that I should."

"How was this young woman dressed?"

"She wore a lang, black tweed cloak wi' a hood till it, and a dark vail."

A few more questions were asked, but as nothing new was elicited the
witness was permitted to retire.

Other witnesses were examined, and old witnesses were recalled hour after
hour and day after day, without effect. No new light was thrown upon the
mystery.

No one, except Cuddie McGill, the saddler's apprentice, could be found
who had seen the suspicious man and woman lurking under the balcony.

Certainly Lord Arondelle remembered the "dream" Miss Levison had told him
of the two persons whom she mistook to be himself and Rose Cameron
talking together under her window. But Miss Levison was so far incapable
of giving evidence as to be lying at the point of death with brain fever.
So it would have been worse than useless to have spoken of her dream, or
supposed dream.

The coroner's inquest sat several days without arriving at any definite
conclusion.

The most plausible theory of the murder seemed to be that a robbery had
been planned between the valet and certain unknown confederates, who had
all been tempted by the great treasures known to be in the castle that
night in the form of costly bridal presents; that no murder was at first
intended; that the confederates had been secretly admitted to the castle
through the conniva