e collie, but a swift upward curl of the lip and
baring of the teeth, accompanied by a deep, snorting growl, warned him
that Whitefoot would have none of him.

Nevertheless, the dog went and came freely, and as the spy made no
further advances, Whitefoot soon ceased to regard him at all. And ever
more curiously Eben McClure kept his eyes on the outgoings and incomings
of Whitefoot.

And so it was that one still afternoon he found himself hidden under the
dense greenish-black umbrella of a yew tree, lying prone on the ivied
wall of the orchard of Ladykirk and listening to the talk of Patsy and
Miss Aline, who were sitting beneath in a creeper-covered "tonelle,"
work-baskets by their sides, and as peaceful as if Ladykirk had been
Eden on the eve of the coming of the serpent.

"Well," said Miss Aline, a little pleasantly tremulous with a sense of
living among wild adventure, "have you had any news to-day? I saw your
four-footed friend waiting for you at the corner of the shrubbery!"

"My Lord Wargrove has been to call upon Earl Raincy at the Castle," said
Patsy with unusual demureness. "Louis could not tell what he wanted, but
at any rate Earl Raincy promptly sent him and his insolence to--a place
you have heard of in church. He said it so loud and plain that the whole
house heard him, and he added remarks about royal dukes which would have
brought him to the scaffold along with his grandfather, if only he had
lived a century earlier."

"Perhaps the man only wanted to find out if you were there. Well,
now--" Miss Aline pondered, "the thing is not so foolish as it looks. For
little Lady Raincy, Louis's mother, might have secreted you somewhere
and never told the earl. The Castle is big enough, I'm sure. But, my
dear, you are better here. I am glad that you gave me the preference."

At this moment there was a stir up at the house of Ladykirk, whereupon
the spy modestly retired. He did not mind listening to the talk of
women, spread-eagled on the wall and hidden by the yew shade, but then,
again, he might chance upon men who were looking for him and find
himself very suddenly with a gunshot through him, or packed along with
the cockroaches in the grimy hold of the _Good Intent_. Captain Penman
was a singularly unsociable shipmate at the best of times for a man of
Eben's profession, and might even go the length of throwing him
overboard some dark night, merely, as it were, in order to lighten ship.

So the spy betook hi