he door of the vault, watching with
anxiety the motions of Colonel Ashton and the stranger, who now appeared
to be in close conference beneath the shade of a yew-tree, in the most
remote part of the burial-ground.

To this sequestered spot Colonel Ashton had guided the stranger, and
then turning round, addressed him in a stern and composed tone.--"I
cannot doubt that I speak to the Master of Ravenswood?" No answer was
returned. "I cannot doubt," resumed the Colonel, trembling with rising
passion, "that I speak to the murderer of my sister!"

"You have named me but too truly," said Ravenswood, in a hollow and
tremulous voice.

"If you repent what you have done," said the Colonel, "may your
penitence avail you before God; with me it shall serve you nothing.
Here," he said, giving a paper, "is the measure of my sword, and a
memorandum of the time and place of meeting. Sunrise to-morrow morning,
on the links to the east of Wolf's Hope."

The Master of Ravenswood held the paper in his hand, and seemed
irresolute. At length he spoke--"Do not," he said, "urge to farther
desperation a wretch who is already desperate. Enjoy your life while you
can, and let me seek my death from another."

"That you never, never shall!" said Douglas Ashton. "You shall die by my
hand, or you shall complete the ruin of my family by taking my life. If
you refuse my open challenge, there is no advantage I will not take of
you, no indignity with which I will not load you, until the very name of
Ravenswood shall be the sign of everything that is dishonourable, as it
is already of all that is villainous."

"That it shall never be," said Ravenswood, fiercely; "if I am the last
who must bear it, I owe it to those who once owned it that the name
shall be extinguished without infamy. I accept your challenge, time, and
place of meeting. We meet, I presume, alone?"

"Alone we meet," said Colonel Ashton, "and alone will the survivor of us
return from that place of rendezvous."

"Then God have mercy on the soul of him who falls!" said Ravenswood.

"So be it!" said Colonel Ashton; "so far can my charity reach even for
the man I hate most deadly, and with the deepest reason. Now, break off,
for we shall be interrupted. The links by the sea-shore to the east of
Wolf's Hope; the hour, sunrise; our swords our only weapons."

"Enough," said the Master, "I will not fail you."

They separated; Colonel Ashton joining the rest of the mourners, and the
Master