es her only
chance of escape.

With a slow gliding motion she gains the end of the wall, and sees the
open square of the old court before her.

Some one may be watching from behind those broken buttresses, she
knows; but she is desperate, and has no time to count the chances. With
a rapid step she crosses the square, and is almost at the open gateway
when a man steps forward and holds her back by the arm.

"Not so fast, miss! Shure ye'd not be for forgetting the masther!"

With a sharp cry of fear she struggles to get free; but she might as
well try to fly as to loose her arm from the grip of those grimy
fingers.

Surely the steps she heard a little while ago are coming back
again--more slowly this time, but still coming! Yes, and it is
Brian--she knows it; she cannot be mistaken, and, yielding to a sudden
impulse, she calls his name aloud, calls it again and again, in her
utter helplessness and misery.

She does not think that he will hear and come to her. She has no hope
of help from any quarter, as she looks round upon the dark menacing
faces of the men who have gathered so noiselessly and rapidly about
her. She is in their power--she realizes that; and, as a Blake of
Donaghmore, she expects but little mercy, unless it be granted her for
Power Magill's sake.

He has come up to her now, and the men fall back a little at a sign
from him.

"Are you mad, Honor?" he asks hoarsely. "Is it your own death or is it
mine that you seek this night?"

"Oh, let me go home!" she moaned, looking at him piteously. "If ever
you loved me, Power, let me go home!"

But a threatening murmur rises from the men about them.

"If I would trust you to carry our secret back to Donaghmore they would
not," he said curtly. "No, no, Honor--there is no turning back for
either of us!"

The steps--the slow, heavy tread, as of a man in deep thought--are
close at hand now. She can hear them plainly; so does Power, for he
pauses and seems almost to hold his breath in the deep stillness that
has fallen upon the place.

Through this quiet Honor's despairing cry--"Brian--oh, Brian, come to
me!"--rings sharply out.

She hears a shout as if in answer; and the hoarse murmur of threatening
voices fills her heart with fear. She has twisted her ankle on the
rough stones, and now, when she tries to move, she cannot, so she
crouches back against the wall and waits for the help that she is sure
is coming in an agony that is fast merging into unco