f

break their stony silence and tell what they had witnessed. Mrs. Egerton had come at last to fetch them, for the hour was drawing towards midnight, and the party in the Drawing Room wearying for the night's repose. Lingering a little on her way, Geraldine was following her mother up the stairs, when a hand was laid detainingly npon her arm, and she saw Lord Rotherhame looking at her with a gaze so intent in its wistful earnestness that it almost startled her.

"What is the matter?" she asked, with nervous anxiety.

66

Nothing," he replied.

"But I am sure there is! What makes you look so strange all at once?"

"I was wondering whether you would ever bring yourself to bear it," he answered, slowly, "you who come from such a free, merry home, you, who to-night have so often called it gloomy and dreadful. How will you bear year after year to breathe its sad atmosphere? Do you not feel that there are spectres in this thick air-haunting spectres of crime done, and misery suffered? Do you feel any shade of misgiving, Geraldine? Do you in the least repent ?"

She read trouble in his eyes, and felt that the hand she held was dry and hot. It was impossible to hear the tremulous earnestness of his tones and give him a light reply.

VOL. III.

с

"No such thought ever crossed me, Kenelm. I love the house for its own sake; but if it were a prison, or a mad-house, it would be Heaven shared with you."

"A mad-house or a prison ?" he repeated, gloomily. "Words are easy.'

"Love makes deeds as easy. Do not allow yourself to be tormented by thoughts of the past, however sad. Such dull vapours are half the product of our own imaginations, and what we make we can surely destroy. Let us create fresh associations for ourselves, and fill the old house anew with memories of love and kindness."

"I will do all that in me lies towards laying the ghosts that trouble it!" was his rejoinder. That much I owe you, and henceforward my duty to you transcends all other obligations!"

He spoke positively, like one who would keep down doubts by force. Then stooping, he kissed her cheek. It was to him a sacramental kiss, in which, for the remainder of his days, he devoted conscience, soul, and self blindly to her service.

Geraldine guessed nothing of the guilt that kiss implied. And yet that night she stood long before her window, perplexed and too full of thought to sleep. The downpour had ceased, and the stars, emerging from moment to moment from behind the black, rapid clouds, glassed themselves in the rainpools below. The sharp lines of the towers

and walls of defence which girded the Castle were rendered indistinct by the creeping ivy that canopied their battlements and the dream-like darkness that wrapped them round. A deep, monotonous cry from the bloodhounds' distant kennels, blended with the hooting of owls and the stormy sighing of the wind, made up together that profound and sombre harmony of night which snares the soul to fearful musings. Geraldine's face became sadder as she looked and listened, and she involuntarily trembled as she remembered that the promised bliss which filled her with such wild longing of desire was not yet securely in her grasp. But the moment that her transient melancholy took this tangible shape, the young girl, in love with happiness, flung it from her, and turning in displeasure from the scene which had engendered it, let the curtains drop, and returned to the fireside to distract herself with the harmless chatter of her voluble companion.

CHAPTER II.

Many a green isle there must be
In the deep wide sea of misery.

SHELLEY.

"DINEY," said Lord Rotherhame next morning, "your mother insists upon it that you are to pay your respects at the Rectory on your way home."

They had been for more than two hours out of doors, revelling in the exhilarating freshness of a glorious October morning. The distance lay veiled in a grey mist, which deepened towards the horizon into a mellow purple haze. The slant sun-rays fell warmly on the reddening trees and hedges laden with blackberries, and the dew shimmered thick and white upon the turf. Deep into the forest, beneath the shade of stately oaks and arching beeches, Geraldine had wandered, delighting Lord Rotherhame by her eager appreciation of his beloved glades. The Archdeacon, her mother, and Miss Nutting followed at a respectful distance. The little party had started together, but her impatience had carried her in advance of her parents. They had been the round of the stables, where Lord Rotherhame had bestowed upon his future bride a small but beautiful black mare, a creature with the spirit of a

tiger and the gentleness of a lamb, who had greeted his young mistress with a proud arch of the neck and an attempted lick of the hand. They had gone to the school, where the children, staring at the intruders with round, fixed eyes, had been put through the regulation exhibition of marching, singing, and reading aloud, and now they were hastening down the quaint village street, past whitewashed cottages, little gardens gay with sunflowers, and diamond-paned windows under low-browed eaves, through which the villagers were peeping curiously at the future Countess. At last, on the village green, where once the penal stocks had stood, and the blacksmith now struck his merry anvil, they had paused before the familiar Rectory gate.

"I kept your mother's orders a secret till this moment you see," said Lord Rotherhame, "fearing that you might bolt, or attempt some other rebellious action. Will you be generous now, Diney, and forgive your enemy? I can answer for him that the worthy Rector will be penitent from the depths of his heart, and from what I know of you I should think you would find it difficult to keep anger long."

"Indeed you don't know me!" she answered seriously, as if defending herself from some injurious imputation. "I don't find it at all easy to forgive Dr. Bogle. I have promised mamma to try, and so I will!"