through
his long hair, and was soon weeping over a sonata of his own
composition.

Dacre, who was standing apart from the others, before a picture, in a
dark recess of the hall, was approached by a footman, who made a quick
sign to him, a sign such as Featherstone had made to Geoffrey a few
moments before.

Sir John answered, and the servant, in handing him a cup of coffee,
slipped a note into his hand. The footman went on handing the coffee,
calm and unmoved.

Dacre, after glancing at the letter, thrust it into his waistcoat
pocket, and furtively glanced at Geoffrey. The latter excused himself to
Miss Windsor.

"I wish to have a long and private conversation with you," said Dacre to
him, "and when you take your leave I will walk over with you to your
house, where we can talk together."

Mrs. Carey, before the party broke up, excused herself on the grounds of
a severe headache and retired to her room. She sat there for some time
looking out upon the ocean and the moon-glade, glistening and twisting
over the waves like a great serpent. Of a sudden she threw over her
shoulders a thick cloak, and, by a dark back passage of the old house,
stole out into the moonlight. She felt a desire to walk along the cliff
and to soothe her nerves with the deep booming of the waves along its
base. And, perhaps, she might meet Geoffrey on his way home, she
thought, not forgetting the potency of moonlight and the great Love God,
"Juxtaposition."

CHAPTER VI.

THE ROYALISTS.

It was a clear, cold night as the two strangely dissimilar friends,
Dacre and Geoffrey, emerged from the shadow of Ripon Wood and stood for
a moment on the cliff path looking down at the unquiet sea, which was
still heaving and breaking from the force of the day's storm. From the
horizon before them the full moon had risen about two hand-breadths, and
the sky was all barred and broken with torn clouds moving rapidly,
behind which the moonlight filled the sky. The white light fell on the
black sea like spilled silver, and made a glittering road across the
waves.

Dacre advanced to the very edge of the cliff and stood with folded arms,
looking into the night as if it were a face or scroll to be read. But
the eye, in truth, saw not, though the thoughtless sense perceived the
shifting clouds and tossing sea. The vision was introspective wholly. It
was turned on a wide inner field, where stood arrayed, like an order of
battle, a strange array of Princ