aggression of the squire's carriage, and entreating their captain's
instant advice. If Clifford had before wavered in his disinterested
determination,--if visions of Lucy, of happiness, and reform had floated
in his solitary ride too frequently and too glowingly before his eyes,--
the sight of these men, their conversation, their danger, all sufficed to
restore his resolution. "Merciful God!" thought he, "and is it to the
comrade of such lawless villains, to a man, like them, exposed hourly to
the most ignominious of deaths, that I have for one section of a moment
dreamed of consigning the innocent and generous girl, whose trust or love
is the only crime that could deprive her of the most brilliant destiny?"

Short were Clifford's instructions to his followers, and so much do we do
mechanically, that they were delivered with his usual forethought and
precision. "You will leave the town instantly; go not, for your lives,
to London, or to rejoin any of your comrades. Ride for the Red Cave;
provisions are stored there, and, since our late alteration of the
interior, it will afford ample room to conceal your horses. On the night
of the second day from this I will join you. But be sure that you enter
the cave at night, and quit it upon no account till I come!"

"Yes!" said he, when he was alone, "I will join you again, but only to
quit you. One more offence against the law, or at least one sum wrested
from the swollen hands of the rich sufficient to equip me for a foreign
army, and I quit the country of my birth and my crimes. If I cannot
deserve Lucy Brandon, I will be somewhat less unworthy. Perhaps--why
not? I am young, my nerves are not weak, my brain is not dull,--perhaps
I may in some field of honourable adventure win a name that before my
death-bed I may not blush to acknowledge to her!"

While this resolve beat high within Clifford's breast, Lucy sadly and in