letter had been colder and shorter; she yearned to hear him say, with his
own lips, that he loved her still. This idea banished or prevailed over
all others. She thanked her uncle cheerfully and gayly, and the journey
was settled.

"Be at watch early on Monday," said Olivier to his son.

Monday came; the baronet had ordered the carriage to be at the door at
ten. A little before eight, Lucretia stole out, and took her way to
Guy's Oak. Gabriel had placed himself in readiness; he had climbed a
tree at the bottom of the park (near the place where hitherto he had lost
sight of her); she passed under it,--on through a dark grove of pollard
oaks. When she was at a sufficient distance, the boy dropped from his
perch; with the stealth of an Indian he crept on her trace, following
from tree to tree, always sheltered, always watchful. He saw her pause
at the dell and look round; she descended into the hollow; he slunk
through the fern; he gained the marge of the dell, and looked down,--she
was lost to his sight. At length, to his surprise, he saw the gleam of
her robe emerge from the hollow of a tree,--her head stooped as she came
through the aperture; he had time to shrink back amongst the fern; she
passed on hurriedly, the same way she had taken, back to the house; then
into the dell crept the boy. Guy's Oak, vast and venerable, with gnarled
green boughs below, and sere branches above, that told that its day of
fall was decreed at last, rose high from the abyss of the hollow, high
and far-seen amidst the trees that stood on the vantage-ground above,--
even as a great name soars the loftier when it springs from the grave. A
dark and irregular fissure gave entrance to the heart of the oak. The
boy glided in and looked round; he saw nothing, yet something there must
be. The rays of the early sun did not penetrate into the hollow, it was
as dim as a cave. He felt slowly in every crevice, and a startled moth