aused
an unpleasant odour. How well I remember every little circumstance
in connection with that night! It promised to be tempestuous, for the
clouds were piling up in the north-west, and the dark wrack was drifting
across the face of the moon, throwing alternate belts of light and shade
upon the rugged surface of the island and the restless sea beyond.

We were standing talking close by the door of the cottage, and I was
thinking to myself that my friend was more cheerful than he had been
since his illness, when he gave a sudden, sharp cry, and looking round
at him I saw, by the light of the moon, an expression of unutterable
horror come over his features. His eyes became fixed and staring, as
if riveted upon some approaching object, and he extended his long thin
forefinger, which quivered as he pointed.

"Look there!" he cried. "It is she! It is she! You see her there coming
down the side of the brae." He gripped me convulsively by the wrist as
he spoke. "There she is, coming towards us!"

"Who?" I cried, straining my eyes into the darkness.

"She--Kate--Kate Northcott!" he screamed. "She has come for me. Hold me
fast, old friend. Don't let me go!"

"Hold up, old man," I said, clapping him on the shoulder. "Pull yourself
together; you are dreaming; there is nothing to fear."

"She is gone!" he cried, with a gasp of relief. "No, by heaven! there
she is again, and nearer--coming nearer. She told me she would come for
me, and she keeps her word."

"Come into the house," I said. His hand, as I grasped it, was as cold as
ice.

"Ah, I knew it!" he shouted. "There she is, waving her arms. She is
beckoning to me. It is the signal. I must go. I am coming, Kate; I am
coming!"

I threw my arms around him, but he burst from me with superhuman
strength, and dashed into the darkness of the night. I followed him,
calling to him to stop, but he ran the more swiftly. When the moon
shone out between the clouds I could catch a glimpse of his dark figure,
running rapidly in a straight line, as if to reach some definite goal.
It may have been imagination, but it seemed to me that in the flickering
light I could distinguish a vague something in front of him--a
shimmering form which eluded his grasp and led him onwards. I saw his
outlines stand out hard against the sky behind him as he surmounted the
brow of a little hill, then he disappeared, and that was the last ever
seen by mortal eye of Barrington Cowles.

The fishermen an