pen road, with a helpless anger on
him.

A crescent moon was struggling through floes of fleecy clouds, the
stars were shining, and so the road was not entirely dark. He went about
thirty steps, then turned and looked back. The figure was still standing
there, with the pistol and the light. He walked on another twenty or
thirty steps, and once again looked back. The light and the pistol were
still there. Again he walked on. But now he heard the rumble of buggy
wheels behind. Once more he looked back: the figure and the light had
gone. The buggy wheels sounded nearer. With a sudden feeling of courage,
he turned round and ran back swiftly. The light suddenly flashed again.

"It's no use," he said to himself, and turned and walked slowly along
the road.

The sound of the buggy wheels came still nearer. Presently it was
obscured by passing under the huge branches of the tree. Then the horse,
buggy and driver appeared at the other side, and in a few moments had
overtaken him. He looked up sharply, scrutinisingly. Suddenly he burst
out:

"Holy mother, Chris, is that you! Where've you been? Are you all right?"

She had whipped up her horse at first sight of him, thinking he might be
some drunken rough.

"Mais, mon dieu, Nic, is that you? I thought at first you were a
highwayman!"

"No, you've passed the highwayman! Come, let me get in."

Five minutes afterwards she knew exactly what had happened to him.

"Who could it be?" she asked.

"I thought at first it was that beast Vanne Castine!" he answered; "he's
the only one that knew about the money, besides the agent and the old
seigneur. He brought word from Papineau. But it was too tall for him,
and he wouldn't have been so quiet about it. Just like a ghost. It makes
my flesh creep now!"

It did not seem such a terrible thing to her at the moment, for she had
in her pocket the licence to marry the Honourable Tom Ferrol upon the
morrow, and she thought, with joy, of seeing him just as soon as she set
foot in the doorway of the Manor Casimbault.

It was something of a shock to her that she did not see him for quite
a half hour after she arrived home, and that was half past ten o'clock.
But women forget neglect quickly in the delight of a lover's presence;
so her disappointment passed. Yet she could not help speaking of it.

"Why weren't you at the door to meet me when I came back to-night with
that-that in my pocket?" she asked him, his arm round her.

"I've got