oth, and hurried out of the room.

That evening, with beating heart, he walked towards Tolcarne gates. He
had been busy amongst his papers, tearing up and making ready for that
which he had to do on the morrow; and now, more agitated than he would
own, he sought the lane where so many happy hours had been spent to see
if Tiny Rea would grant him the interview he had written to ask for,
that he might say good-bye.

It was a soft, balmy night, and the stars seemed to look sadly down
through the trees as he leaned against a mass of lichen-covered granite,
pink here and there with the pretty stonecrop of the place, waiting, for
she was behind time.

"Will she come," he said, "now that I am a beggar without a shilling,
save that which I could earn? Oh, shame! shame! shame! How could I
doubt her?"

No, he would not doubt her; she could not have cared about his money.
She was too sweet and loving and gentle. And what should he say--wait?
No, he dared not. He could only--only--leave her free, that she might--

"Oh, my darling!" he groaned; and he laid his broad forehead upon the
hard, rugged stone, weeping now like a child.

The clouds came across the sky, blotting out one by one the glistening
stars; a chilly mist swept along the valley from the sea, and all around
was dark and cold as the future of his blasted life. For the minutes
glided into hours, and she came not--came not to say one gentle, loving
word--one God-speed to send him on his way; and at last, heart-broken,
he staggered to the great floral gate, held the chilly rails, kissed the
iron, and gazed with passionate longing up at the now darkened house,
and then walked slowly away, stunned by the violence of his grief.

The wind was rising fast, and coming in heavy soughs from off the sea.
As he reached the lodge gates at Penreife he paused, staring before him
in a helpless way, till a heavy squall smote him, and with it a sharp
shower of rain, whose drops seemed to cool his forehead and rouse him to
action.

Starting off, with great strides, he took the short cut, and made for
the sea, where the fields ended suddenly, their short, thyme-scented
grass seeming to have been cut where there was a fall of full four
hundred feet, down past a rugged, piled-up wall of granite, to the
white-veined rock, polished by the restless sea below. To any one
unaccustomed to the coast a walk there on a dark night meant death,
either by mutilation on the cruel rocks, al