its pace, vanished behind one of the hillocks clothed with brushwood,
that gave so primitive and forest-like a character to the old ground.
Advancing still, there now,--at her right hand, grew out of the landscape
the noble turrets of the unfinished pile; and, close at her left, under a
gnarled fantastic thorn-tree, the still lake at his feet reflecting his
stiller shadow, reclined Guy Darrell, the doe nestled at his side.

So unexpected this sight--he, whom she came to seek yet feared to see, so
close upon her way--the lady uttered a faint but sharp cry, and Darrell
sprang to his feet. She stood before him, veiled, mantled, bending as a
suppliant.

"Avaunt!" he faltered wildly. "Is this a spirit my own black solitude
conjures up--or is it a delusion, a dream?" It is I--I!--the Caroline
dear to you once, if detested now! Forgive me! Not for myself I come."
She flung back her veil-her eyes pleadingly sought his.

"So," said Darrell, gathering his arms round his breast in the gesture
peculiar to him when seeking either to calm a more turbulent movement, or
to confirm a sterner resolution of his heart--"so! Caroline, Marchioness
of Montfort, we are then fated to meet face to face at last! I
understand--Lionel Haughton sent, or showed to you, my letter?"

"Oh! Mr. Darrell, how could you have the heart to write in such terms of
one who--"

"One who had taken the heart from my bosom and trampled it into the mire.
True, fribbles will say, 'Fie! the vocabulary of fine gentlemen has no
harsh terms for women.' Gallants, to whom love is pastime, leave or are
left with elegant sorrow and courtly bows. Madam, I was never such airy