at all in that direction. Then, in the blacker darkness that ensued, I
remembered that I had turned my horse slightly while talking of the
matter. I could not now tell exactly which direction we had come from.
It occurred to me that perhaps for some time we had wandered about in no
path at all, going where trees and underbrush left space clear enough to
be mistaken.

I confessed that I knew not which way to go, even to find the original
path.

"Is it best to ride on at random, in hope of coming upon something, or
to stay where we are till daylight?" I asked.

The Countess had no will upon the matter. But the question was decided
for me by a heavy downpour of rain, which came in a rush without
warning. It was evident that the foliage over us was not thick. So I
shouted to the Countess that we would go on till we found trees that
gave more protection. I urged my horse to move, letting him choose his
own course, and he obediently toiled forward, I exerting myself to keep
the other horse close, and also feeling the way with my whip.

As swift as the oncoming of the rain, was the increase of the lightning,
both in frequency and intensity. The fall of the rain seemed loud beyond
measure, but it was drowned out of all hearing when the thunder rolled
and reverberated across the sky. In the bright bursts of lightning, the
trees, seen through falling rain, seemed like companions suffering with
us the chastisement of the heavens; but in the darkness that intervened
between the flashes, the forest and all the world seemed to have died
out of existence, leaving nothing but the pelting waters and the din of
the storm.

At last we came, not to a region where the boughs were less penetrable,
but to an open space where the downpour had us entirely at its mercy. I
thought at first we had got out of the forest, or into the glade we had
left: but a brilliant flash showed us it was another small clearing,
which rose slightly toward the thick woods on its further side. And the
same lightning revealed, against the background of trees, a solitary
tower, old and half-ruined, slender and of no great height. A doorway on
a level with the ground stood half open.

"Did you see that?" I cried, when the lightning had passed. "There is
shelter."

"It must be the tower of Morlon," said the Countess.

"And who lives there?"

"Nobody,--at least it was said to be empty when I used to hear of it. It
is all that is left of a house that was dest