iness at the thought of hearing him
say it himself. I knew he was going to say it now.

He held my hand and stroked it. "My mother told you, Ysobel--what I am
waiting for?" he said.

"Yes."

"Do you know I love you?" he said, very low.

"Yes. I love you, too. My whole life would have been heaven if we could
always have been together," was my answer.

He drew me up into his arms so that my cheek lay against his breast as
I went on, holding fast to the rough tweed of his jacket and whispering:
"I should have belonged to you two, heart and body and soul. I should
never have been lonely again. I should have known nothing, whatsoever
happened, but tender joy."

"Whatsoever happened?" he murmured.

"Whatsoever happens now, Ysobel, know nothing but tender joy. I think
you CAN. 'Out on the Hillside!' Let us remember."

"Yes, yes," I said; "'Out on the Hillside.'" And our two faces, damp
with the sweet mist, were pressed together.

CHAPTER X

The mist had floated away, and the moor was drenched with golden
sunshine when we went back to the castle. As we entered the hall I heard
the sound of a dog howling, and spoke of it to one of the men-servants
who had opened the door.

"That sounds like Gelert. Is he shut up somewhere?"

Gelert was a beautiful sheep-dog who belonged to Feargus and was his
heart's friend. I allowed him to be kept in the courtyard.

The man hesitated before he answered me, with a curiously grave face.

"It is Gelert, miss. He is howling for his master. We were obliged to
shut him in the stables."

"But Feargus ought to have reached here by this time," I was beginning.

I was stopped because I found Angus Macayre almost at my elbow. He had
that moment come out of the library. He put his hand on my arm.

"Will ye come with me?" he said, and led me back to the room he had
just left. He kept his hand on my arm when we all stood together inside,
Hector and I looking at him in wondering question. He was going to tell
me something--we both saw that.

"It is a sad thing you have to hear," he said. "He was a fine man,
Feargus, and a most faithful servant. He went to see his mother last
night and came back late across the moor. There was a heavy mist, and he
must have lost his way. A shepherd found his body in a tarn at daybreak.
They took him back to his father's home."

I looked at Hector MacNairn and again at Angus. "But it couldn't be
Feargus," I cried. "I saw him an hour ago. He passed u