andy; and the barrow
rattled more loudly than ever, as he dashed along till he came to an
alley, down which, a good quarter of a mile from where he stood, he
could see Sir Murray and Lady Gernon.

"There they are, then," he muttered; and running the barrow aside, he
took out basket and fork, and began to thread his way amongst the trees,
so as to approach unseen close to where his master and Lady Gernon were
walking.

But Sandy McCray was a cautious man, and before he had gone many yards
he had stooped to dig up half-a-dozen hart's-tongue ferns, which he
placed, with a fair quantity of leaf-mould, in his basket.

"There's my answer to whatever they speer," he muttered; and then,
creeping cautiously forward, he made his way to where, by holding aside
the hazel boughs, he could peer out into the alley, where in a few
minutes he saw the couple he watched pass by within a couple of yards of
where he stood, silently and without hardly a rustle of the leaves
amongst which they passed.

But just as they had gone by they stopped short, Lady Gernon holding
tightly by Sir Murray's arm, as she gazed, with a wild, eager stare in
his face.

"We had better make haste back, Lady Gernon," he said, quietly, and with
a peculiar smile; and then they walked on.

"There, now! What could be better than that?" said McCray, as soon as
he was alone. "She looks pale, but they were quiet enow. But what did
he mean by showing his teeth to her when he smilt?"

Sandy McCray shook his head, and then, in obedience to his instructions,
he followed slowly, contriving from time to time to keep the couple in
sight, but ever and anon shaking his head as if something troubled him.
At last he said, half aloud:

"The lassie is richt, after a'. There's your gude, sweet kiss, and your
Judas kiss, and I think perhaps she did richt in sending me; but it's a
sail job to leave one's work i' the daytime, and after a' there was not
much to come for."

Had Sandy McCray been there five--nay, four--minutes sooner, he would
have been of a different opinion, for Sir Murray Gernon, led, perhaps,
by some tricksy sprite of the woods--some Puck of modern times--had
hurried on and on, each moment growing more and more angry and excited
at having missed the object of his search. For days past she had never
left the Castle unwatched, but this time she had gone out suddenly, and
at an hour when he had believed her to be in her bedroom. That there
was some defini