that
rustled by her path. Muffled and alone, she took her adventurous
journey to the mill, where she arrived in about an hour from her
departure. Ralph was anxiously expecting her, together with his dame.

"Good e'en, lady," said the latter, with great alacrity, as Eleanor
crossed the threshold. She returned the salutation; but her features
were lighted up with a wild and deceptive brightness, and her glowing
eye betrayed the fierce and raging conflict within.

"The shadow will soon point to the hour, and we must be gone," said
the impatient miller.

"Lead on," replied the courageous maiden; and he shrank from her gaze,
conscious of his own treachery and her danger.

The hard and ice-bound waters were dissolving, and might be heard to
gurgle in their deep recesses; drops began to trickle from the trees,
the bushes to relax their hold, and shake off their icy trammels.
Towards the south-west lay a dense range of clouds, their fleecy tops
telling with what message they were charged. Still the moon cast a
subdued and lingering light over the scene, from which she was shortly
destined to be shut out.

Ralph led the way silently and with great caution through the slippery
ravine. The moonlight flickered through the leafless branches on the
heights above them, their path winding through the shadows by the
stream.

"We must hasten," said her guide, "or we may miss the signal. We shall
soon take leave of the moonlight, and perhaps lose our labour
thereby."

They crept onwards until they saw the dark rocks in the Fairies'
Chapel. The miller pointed to a long withered bough that flung out its
giant arms far over the gulph from a great height. The moon threw down
the shadow quite across to the bank on the other side, marking its
rude outline on the crags.

"The signal," said Ralph; "and by your favour, lady, I must depart. I
have redeemed my pledge."

"Stay, I prithee, but within hearing," said Eleanor. "I like not the
aspect of this place. If I call, hasten instantly to my succour."

The miller promised, but with a secret determination not to risk his
carcase again for all the bright-eyed dames in Christendom.

She listened to his departing footsteps, and her heart seemed to lose
its support. An indescribable feeling crept upon her--a consciousness
that another was present in this solitude. She was evidently under the
control of some invisible agent; the very freedom of her thoughts
oppressed and overruled by a po