ain's
instant advice. If Clifford had before wavered in his disinterested
determination,--if visions of Lucy, of happiness, and reform had
floated in his solitary ride too frequently and too glowingly before
his eyes,--the sight of these men, their conversation, their danger, all
sufficed to restore his resolution. "Merciful God!" thought he, "and is
it to the comrade of such lawless villains, to a man, like them, exposed
hourly to the most ignominious of deaths, that I have for one section
of a moment dreamed of consigning the innocent and generous girl, whose
trust or love is the only crime that could deprive her of the most
brilliant destiny?"

Short were Clifford's instructions to his followers, and so much do we
do mechanically, that they were delivered with his usual forethought and
precision. "You will leave the town instantly; go not, for your lives,
to London, or to rejoin any of your comrades. Ride for the Red Cave;
provisions are stored there, and, since our late alteration of the
interior, it will afford ample room to conceal your horses. On the night
of the second day from this I will join you. But be sure that you enter
the cave at night, and quit it upon no account till I come!"

"Yes!" said he, when he was alone, "I will join you again, but only to
quit you. One more offence against the law, or at least one sum wrested
from the swollen hands of the rich sufficient to equip me for a foreign
army, and I quit the country of my birth and my crimes. If I cannot
deserve Lucy Brandon, I will be somewhat less unworthy. Perhaps--why
not? I am young, my nerves are not weak, my brain is not dull,--perhaps
I may in some field of honourable adventure win a name that before my
death-bed I may not blush to acknowledge to her!"

While this resolve beat high within Clifford's breast, Lucy sadly and
in silence was continuing with the squire her short journey to Bath. The
latter was very inquisitive to know why Clifford had gone, and what he
had avowed; and Lucy, scarcely able to answer, threw everything on the
promised letter of the night.

"I am glad," muttered the squire to her, "that he is going to write;
for, somehow or other, though I questioned him very tightly, he slipped
through my cross-examination, and bursting out at once as to his love
for you, left me as wise about himself as I was before: no doubt (for
my own part I don't see what should prevent his being a great man
incog.)this letter will explain all!"