er feet falling noiselessly, she entered the grass-grown courtyard,
where stood the ancient spreading yew, the "dule-tree," under which the
Glencardine charters had been signed and justice administered. Other big
trees had sprung from seedlings since the place had fallen into ruin;
and, having entered, she paused amidst its weird, impressive silence.
Those high, ponderous walls about her spoke mutely of strength and
impregnability. Those grass-grown mounds hid ruined walls and broken
foundations. What tales of wild lawlessness and reckless bloodshed they
all could tell!

Many of the strange stories she had heard concerning the old
place--stories told by the people in the neighbourhood--were recalled as
she stood there gazing wonderingly about her. Many romantic legends had,
indeed, been handed down in Perthshire from generation to generation
concerning old Glencardine and its lawless masters, and for her they had
always possessed a strange fascination, for had she not inherited the
antiquarian tastes of her father, and had she not read many works upon
folklore and such-like subjects.

Suddenly, while standing in the deep shadow, gazing thoughtfully up at
those high towers which, though ruined, still guarded the end of the
glen, a strange thing occurred--something which startled her, causing
her to halt breathless, petrified, rooted to the spot. She stared
straight before her. Something uncanny was happening there, something
that was, indeed, beyond human credence, and quite inexplicable.

CHAPTER XI

CONCERNS THE WHISPERS

What had startled Gabrielle was certainly extraordinary and decidedly
uncanny. She was standing near the southern wall, when, of a sudden, she
heard low but distinct whispers. Again she listened. Yes. The sounds
were not due to her excited imagination at the recollection of those
romantic traditions of love and hatred, or of those gruesome stories of
how the Wolf of Badenoch had been kept prisoner there for five years and
put to frightful tortures, or how the Laird of Weem was deliberately
poisoned in that old banqueting-hall, the huge open fireplace of which
still existed near where she stood.

There was the distinct sound of low, whispered words! She held her
breath to listen. She tried to distinguish what the words were, but in
vain. Then she endeavoured to determine whence they emanated, but was
unable to do so. Again they sounded--again--and yet again. Then there
was another voice, sti