y heard a groan, then something like the sound of a falling body.
Some seconds later the owl's cry was--answered by a tu-whit-tu-whoo.

"It is over," Little Douglas said calmly; "come."

"What is over?" asked the queen; "and what is that groan we heard?"

"There was a sentry at the door on to the lake," the child answered,
"but he is no longer there."

The queen felt her heart's blood grow cold, at the same tine that a
chilly sweat broke out to the roots of her hair; for she perfectly
understood: an unfortunate being had just lost his life on her account.
Tottering, she leaned on Mary Seyton, who herself felt her strength
giving way. Meanwhile Little Douglas was trying the keys: the second
opened the door.

"And the queen?" said in a low voice a man who was waiting on the other
side of the wall.

"She is following me," replied the child.

George Douglas, for it was he, sprang into the garden, and, taking the
queen's arm on one side and Mary Seyton's on the other, he hurried them
away quickly to the lake-side. When passing through the doorway Mary
Stuart could not help throwing an uneasy look about her, and it seemed
to her that a shapeless object was lying at the bottom of the wall, and
as she was shuddering all over.

"Do not pity him," said George in a low voice, "for it is a judgment
from heaven. That man was the infamous Warden who betrayed us."

"Alas!" said the queen, "guilty as he was, he is none the less dead on
my account."

"When it concerned your safety, madam, was one to haggle over drops of
that base blood? But silence! This way, William, this way; let us keep
along the wall, whose shadow hides us. The boat is within twenty steps,
and we are saved."

With these words, George hurried on the two women still more quickly,
and all four, without having been detected, reached the banks of the
lake. 'As Douglas had said, a little boat was waiting; and, on seeing
the fugitives approach, four rowers, couched along its bottom, rose, and
one of them, springing to land, pulled the chain, so that the queen and
Mary Seyton could get in. Douglas seated them at the prow, the child
placed himself at the rudder, and George, with a kick, pushed off the
boat, which began to glide over the lake.

"And now," said he, "we are really saved; for they might as well pursue
a sea swallow on Solway Firth as try to reach us. Row, children, row;
never mind if they hear us: the main thing is to get into the open."

"Who go