who had opened the door.

"That sounds like Gelert. Is he shut up somewhere?"

Gelert was a beautiful sheep-dog who belonged to Feargus and was his
heart's friend. I allowed him to be kept in the courtyard.

The man hesitated before he answered me, with a curiously grave face.

"It is Gelert, miss. He is howling for his master. We were obliged to
shut him in the stables."

"But Feargus ought to have reached here by this time," I was beginning.

I was stopped because I found Angus Macayre almost at my elbow. He had
that moment come out of the library. He put his hand on my arm.

"Will ye come with me?" he said, and led me back to the room he had
just left. He kept his hand on my arm when we all stood together inside,
Hector and I looking at him in wondering question. He was going to tell
me something--we both saw that.

"It is a sad thing you have to hear," he said. "He was a fine man,
Feargus, and a most faithful servant. He went to see his mother last
night and came back late across the moor. There was a heavy mist, and he
must have lost his way. A shepherd found his body in a tarn at daybreak.
They took him back to his father's home."

I looked at Hector MacNairn and again at Angus. "But it couldn't be
Feargus," I cried. "I saw him an hour ago. He passed us playing on his