'she will be quite safe there,' said colonel sampson, returning. 'from the looks of yonder maids i'll warrant they'll make excellent jailors.'

simone was still sitting staring at the door by which victoire had stood. her face had grown white, and marion's arm was around her. mistress keziah held a glass to her lips, and colonel sampson opened the outer door, letting in a breath of sweet air from the channel. presently marion drew her outside on to the terrace, and the two began to walk slowly up and down. the sunlight was breaking through the mist, falling gently on the black and gold heads as the girls passed and repassed the window of the hall.

'they will be best left alone,' said mistress keziah. 'it has been terrible for them both. marion has only just found out how much she is attached to simone, and she has had over much strain of late. what a warm heart beats under that quiet exterior of hers! as for simone! well, if i know my brother and my niece, they will endeavour to atone for the past.' she looked at sampson. 'what are we to do?' she asked abruptly.

sampson strolled over to the hearth, his hands under the lapels of his coat.

'i am afraid,' said the old woman suddenly.

'lest victoire might seek for vengeance?'

'just that.'

'it is your brother's affair, really, you know,' said sampson after a pause.

'tush! my brother! has he not been hopelessly blind? oh!'—a flash of anger dyed the old woman's cheek. her eyes gleamed. she looked at the moment curiously like the old salt eagle. 'i told him,' she said quietly, 'a woman would have known at once that there was something wrong. he chose his own course. i came back to garth too late. i am not going to be too late a second time.'

sampson paced the hall in silence for a while.

'what do you suggest?' he asked, stopping in his walk.

'i should suggest sending the two at once under escort to plymouth. there are plenty of men to spare—my servants and my brother's. the men must not lose sight of them till they are safely embarked.'

'it is really a case for the law. they should be imprisoned.'

mistress keziah shook her head. 'my brother would never do that—for marion's sake—for simone's sake. once he has got over his wrath, he will only have one desire, and that to end the whole contemptible story. if i thought he was coming back to-morrow, i would counsel waiting. but i know he can only just have left london. i will take the risk of his displeasure,' continued the old woman, 'but i am too much afraid of that terrible woman to let her stay under the same roof with simone and my niece. let us send them away, colonel. and the whole thing will be done with.'

for some time the two talked together. colonel sampson, who had a man's dislike of meddling with another man's affairs, presently was convinced that mistress keziah was right.

'i will see them safely embarked myself, i think, or lodge them somewhere in plymouth until the admiral returns. perhaps that will be the best.'

'i care not,' said mistress keziah, 'so long as they leave garth this day.'

after a time mistress keziah picked up the miniature again, and looked at sampson. 'i am an old woman,' she said, 'and a mighty curious one.'

sampson made a low bow. 'to gratify your curiosity is a pleasure. elise d'artois was the most beautiful woman in france. for a spell she did me the honour to accept me among her acquaintance. then de delauret came along.... years passed—more than i care to remember. then, at lady fairfax's house, i was confronted by simone. her face began to haunt me. one afternoon, in the coach with marion she suddenly turned on me with her mother's smile, and i vow i thought the years had turned back, and i was speaking to the peerless elise d'artois. not dreaming that that very night our dear marion and elise's daughter would have sore need of me, i took horse and rode into hertfordshire to my house there. in a secret drawer in my cabinet was the miniature. my plan was to show it to sir john, and then confer as to what steps should be taken. when i got back after two days, i found the fairfax house deserted, a letter awaiting me. the rest you know.'

'it is a vastly strange world,' commented mistress keziah. she sat musing, turning over the miniature.

'why do you smile?' queried sampson.

'i was thinking of my sister constance, and many things. she has a way of saying that garth is a wigwam in a forest, where nothing happens save that the sun rises and sets; a desert island where the tide comes in and the tide goes out. i'll wager she will consider attendance on her majesty a poor exchange for this day's work.'

mistress keziah rose as she spoke, and passed out on to the terrace, while sampson sought the stables, to arrange details of the unpleasant journey that awaited him.

it happened that at that moment lady fairfax was sitting at the dinner-table of the same inn at postbridge where marion and roger had halted in the course of their ride. captain beckenham faced her across the board, and the two were listening to mine host's recital of events which had, in his eyes, lent the same importance to the cornwall road that marks a field of battle on the morrow of the fight. the fact that the innkeeper had been unaware at the time of the significance of the appearance of the headlong riders, the pursuing soldiers, the chariots and horsemen stopping at his door, and was thus distinctly a day behind the fair, did not in the least take from his powers as a story teller.

the lady and gentleman hearkened as they ate, and forbore to explain that they themselves were, in a manner of speaking, a belated rearguard of the procession, the epilogue to the play. lady fairfax listened with a grave expression thoroughly appreciated by her companion across the table. for a considerable distance now, at each inn where they had stopped for food or sleep, they had been regaled with the story which was at heart the same, but disguised according to the particular fancy of each succeeding narrator. the entertainment afforded them was thus akin to an air with variations, each variation a little more tortured than the last, so that it was a matter for considerable skill on the hearers' part to beat out the original tune.

until she had heard at exeter from the governor himself that the prisoner was safe from the reach of justice, lady fairfax had been too anxious to pay much heed to the rumours that had run to meet her on her way. once that assurance gained, however, she gave herself up to a more leisurely journey, and failed not to profit by its diversions.

mine host, having at length satisfied himself that he had done his duty as a story teller: shown the prisoner bearing marks of severe punishment, with bandaged head and broken arm, scarcely able to sit in the saddle; the lady accompanying him so unearthly pale and wrung with anguish that one might have thought she had got out of her coffin that morning, instead of out of her bed; after these two unfortunates a whole regiment, bloodthirsty and hot for vengeance, riding upon the wings of the wind; a broken-hearted father dead on the way beyond salisbury; and innumerable relatives wearing the track into ditches in their haste to hear the reading of the will: after all this, i say, mine host retired to the kitchen with the bottle of his own wine to which lady fairfax had invited him, and left his travellers to sup in peace. as he closed the door, the eyes of the two guests met in undisguised merriment.

'i vow i am beginning to be sorry,' said lady fairfax, 'that to-morrow we arrive at garth. 'twill be an end of these iliads. had my brother only lived fifty miles farther west, why, my niece might have finished the journey with the dead body of the prisoner strapped across her saddle-bow. there is still one mystery,' she added, 'and with time we might have solved it. no one has told us anything about colonel sampson.'

'he is part of the pursuing army, i should imagine,' said beckenham.

'that is but the outside of the affair, of course,' retorted the lady. 'the inmost heart thereof is the reason for his mysterious riding into the country just when my husband was away, and he had promised a father's care to my niece. men are a faithless breed.'

'there will doubtless be some reason,' beckenham replied.

'doubtless! doubtless!' mocked lady fairfax. 'he may have gone to count the milestones on the oxford road, or write a sonnet to the moon.' she yawned behind her pretty hand as she spoke, and presently rising, bade her companion good-night.

lady fairfax's curiosity was not destined to consume her outright. the travellers being early on their way in the morning, it happened that the coach had covered most of the distance to garth, and its fair occupant was looking with secret exultation for old landmarks, when captain beckenham rode up to announce the approach of another vehicle just a little distance behind.

lady fairfax put her head out of the coach door.

'it cannot be the heart-broken father of our host's story,' she said, 'for i see my own servant, reuben, on the box. let us wait, captain beckenham. it would appear that at last something is going to happen. i am weary of riding ever on the morrow of the event.'

the vehicle proved to be the penrock coach, returning from plymouth. there, on the previous evening, colonel sampson had escorted victoire and elise, leaving them with a bodyguard of mistress keziah's providing until her brother should return. nothing loth, mr. sampson accepted lady fairfax's invitation to enter her own coach, and beckenham, suddenly finding he was weary of the saddle, gave his horse to reuben and followed the colonel.

'tell them to drive more slowly,' ordered lady fairfax. 'my ears have of late been shaken into my boots. now, sir, and what have you to say?'

the colonel, it appeared, had much to say. the story so absorbed his fair hearer's attention that the landmarks of the homecoming journey were left ungreeted. lady fairfax listened to the history of roger's escape in growing amazement.

'my little niece!' she exclaimed from time to time. 'who would have thought it possible?'

before she had realised the extent of her wonder at marion's activities, she found herself out of her depth, speechless, confounded, at sampson's revelations concerning madame romaine's little sempstress.

from simone back to marion, from marion and the unknown roger back to simone, lady fairfax's thoughts ran when at last sampson paused in his recital. the colonel, watching her face, was secretly amused. the anger which had been stored up for him on account of his 'desertion' of marion never even found voice; the dismay and disappointment lady fairfax had felt in the manner of her niece's departure from kensington was entirely swallowed up in the thought of this new, strange marion. 'my little niece,' she murmured again.

while she was still pondering, the two coaches drove into garth. a minute later, marion's arms were round her, marion's lips on her cheek. 'dear, dear aunt constance,' she cried, 'i never dreamed you would come all this way to cornwall.'

'i suppose you thought i should be content to sit in tunbridge playing "i love my love with an a,"' retorted the lady, her eyes nevertheless suspiciously moist as she kissed her niece. she held the girl at arm's length. 'dear heart,' she said gently, 'i have feared for you greatly, all these days.'

'there was no other way,' said marion, in tremulous tones. 'do not be angered with me, aunt constance.'

'and a fine story you have left behind,' grumbled lady fairfax, recovering her old manner. 'rumours of runaway marriages flying round kensington, and the court not quite certain whether it can any longer tolerate the aunt of such a niece.'

marion's smiling eyes ran beyond the lady to two figures just emerging from the courtyard.

'why, there is captain beckenham,' she cried. 'welcome to garth, sir.' then as she rose from her curtsey, 'simone is on the terrace,' she added gravely.

'oho!' said lady fairfax softly, with a quick look at her niece as, followed by sampson and beckenham, the two walked round into the garden. 'blows the wind from that quarter? faith! 'tis an uncertain world. and not a stone of this old place altered,' she mused as she went on. 'but how it has shrunk! it seemed to me, when i was a child playing in this garden, to be as big as the tower of london.' she stopped and looked at the grey gabled house. 'not a stone altered,' she repeated. 'and i declare if that isn't my elder sister keziah sitting yonder. dear, dear, i hope i'm not going to be whipped. and where is—— ah! simone, come here at once!'

simone, glancing from lady fairfax to the gentleman behind her, was very glad to hide her sudden confusion under cover of a curtsey directed to both new comers at once. lady fairfax passed her arm affectionately round the girl, and with marion on the other side walked across to the terrace.

'i was always terrified of your aunt keziah,' she murmured. 'i shall look to you two for protection. ten years since we met.'

she nevertheless gently disengaged her arms as the three crossed the stone flags, and by mutual consent, while the sisters greeted each other, the two girls turned to talk to sampson and beckenham.

'it is over,' called lady fairfax presently. 'you may approach. come and sit down. i want to hear the whole story again.'

marion gently placed simone in the spare seat of the stone bench and herself stood with one hand gently resting on mistress keziah's shoulder. the bond between herself and her aunt constance was a very tender one, but there was now another presence in her little shrine of loved ones. mistress keziah's face was wearing a hard look which marion rightly guessed was only a mask. and the old lady was tired. the marks of the vigils she had kept on marion's account could not at once be effaced.

'have you not already heard it all, aunt constance?' asked marion.

'a repetition would be good for one's pride, my dear,'

'how so?' queried marion.

'how so? thus. here i come, after sleepless nights, after completely undoing the peace and quiet of the court and setting her majesty at her wits' end by reason of the loss of her waiting woman and the most important officer in her suite; here i come, i say, with a royal pardon in my pocket. and it is of no consequence whatever. all i do is to sit and hear what happened the day before. i feel as if i simply were not here. i might just as well have stayed in tunbridge and—ah! there is that dear soul curnow. i must go and speak to her. would the admiral but arrive now, we should feel like moses and all the prophets.'

'constance, constance!' remonstrated her sister.

lady fairfax shot a glance at the two girls as she went towards the door. 'i told you,' she said, 'just what...' the rest of her sentence was drowned in mrs. curnow's greeting.

the household of garth now gave itself up to an unaccustomed hilarity: a joy that was all the more heartfelt because of the secure, quiet happiness that underlay the merriment. lady fairfax's presence successfully bridged the gap between the old and the new; she made simone feel that her place must always have been at garth, made marion look away from the uneasy yesterdays to the ever-brightening morrows. mistress keziah, it is true, wore still her old severity, but at times there were hints of the gentleness and love underlying her hard exterior. even the admiral, arriving weary and shaken, was fain to throw off with the dusty apparel of his journey the sorrow and grief of the last few weeks.

after one roaring fit of rage at his own folly, and one grim day spent at plymouth, the old man wisely put the past behind him and settled down at the head of the merry company with supreme content. while seeking from jeffreys a pardon which he was informed had already been granted by the king, the admiral had seized the moment to lay down the burden of office as the special magistrate of the lord chancellor. and although lady fairfax and her brother failed not each to rate the other on the subject of the uselessness of royal pardons, there was an unspoken thanksgiving in their hearts; for the deputy governor's special courier, who had entered the gates of exeter an hour after marion and roger had ridden out, had carried a death warrant in his saddlebag.

when sir john fairfax at last arrived bearing a summons for his wife to return to her majesty's service—a summons which included the unwilling beckenham,—lady fairfax begged the admiral to be allowed to carry her niece back to resume her interrupted visit. but the admiral professed himself fearful of what might happen. kensington was a place where one's peace of mind was insecure, and where, moreover, a 'little niece' was apt to change overmuch for her father's liking. when lady fairfax asserted that the 'little niece' was merely growing up, the admiral pished and pshawed. marion should stay where she was, he said, until simone could be induced to go over and visit the d'artois estates. when that happened—the admiral looked as he spoke at beckenham walking in the garden with simone—why, then, he would come and bring marion himself, perhaps; but he made no promises. and with that lady fairfax was obliged to be content.