-world gardens in the sunset hour. The dried-up
moat was now transformed into a garden filled with rhododendrons and
bright azaleas, while the high ancient beech-hedges, the quaint old
sundial with its motto: "Each time ye shadowe turneth ys one daye nearer
unto dethe," and the old stone balustrades gray with lichen, all spoke
mutely of those glorious days when the fierce horsemen of the Lairds of
Rannoch were feared across the Border, and when many a prisoner of the
Black Douglas had pined and died in those narrow stone chambers in the
grim north tower that still stood high above.

Among the party strolling and lounging there prior to departure were
quite a number of people I knew, people who had shooting-boxes in the
vicinity and were my uncle's friends. In Scotland there is always a
hearty hospitality among the sporting folk, and the laws of caste are
far less rigorous than they are in England.

I was standing chatting with two ladies who were about to take leave of
their hostess, when Leithcourt returned, but alone. Hornby had not
accompanied him. Was it because he feared to again meet me?

In order to ascertain something regarding the man who had so
mysteriously fled from Leghorn, I managed by the exercise of a little
diplomacy to sit on the lawn with a young married woman named Tennant,
wife of a cavalry captain, who was one of the house-party. After a
little time I succeeded in turning the conversation to her fellow
guests, and more particularly to the man I knew as Hornby.

"Oh! Mr. Woodroffe is most amusing," declared the bright little woman.
"He's always playing some practical joke or other. After dinner he is
usually the life and soul of our party."

"Yes," I said, "I like what little I have seen of him. He's a very good
fellow, I should say. I've heard that he's engaged to Muriel," I
hazarded. "Is that true?"

"Of course. They've been engaged nearly a year, but he's been abroad
until quite lately. He is rather close about his own affairs, and never
talks about his travels and adventures, although one day Mr. Leithcourt
declared that his hairbreadth escapes would make a most exciting book if
ever written."

"Leithcourt and he are evidently most intimate friends."

"Oh, quite inseparable!" she laughed. "And the other man who is always
with them is that short, stout, red-faced old fellow standing over there
with the lady in pale blue, Sir Ughtred Gardner. Mr. Woodroffe has
nicknamed him 'Sir Putrid.'"