"The mill-wheel has broken loose; we must go and see to it," she said. It was a queer old building. The mill was separated from the house by a strip of kitchen garden, but a rickety wooden bridge crossed from the upper floor of the mill to the miller's bedroom; the bridge dated back to a time when most of the house itself was used as a granary, and old Rotherson still crossed by it whenever the fancy took him. Greta led the way upstairs to-night; sound sleeper as Nancy was, her mistress did not care to risk unbarring the heavy kitchen door; she and Gabriel wanted no third person to intrude just now. Across the swaying bridge they went, the preacher silent, Greta chattering glibly, with hysterical eagerness to hoodwink her knowledge of calamity. Gabriel's eyes were devouring her greedily, hopelessly; the shadow of a parting stood between them and that short-lived happiness of a moment ago. "The sluice-gates must have given way," said Greta. "Father said, not long since, they were getting too old to see much more service, but he thought they would last a little longer." "The beck was in flood as I came up the Dene to-night." The preacher's voice had a far-away note in it, as if his words had no bearing on the matter in hand. "Yes, that must be it. Do you know anything about the machinery, Gabriel? We can't stop the wheel. What will happen if we let it turn the whole night through?" They were standing close to a pair of mill-stones. Gabriel, still regardless of aught beyond the bitter expiation that lay before him, let his eyes wander to the "shoe" which fed the stones. "Know about the machinery?" he repeated vaguely. "Yes, I know the ins and outs. Your father explained it all to me one afternoon." He no longer dared to look at Greta, but kept his eyes upon the grain, as the hopper doled it out to the shoe, and the shoe to the running-stone. The supply of grain stopped; a curious grating noise sounded from below, as the upper stone found no better work to do than to grind at its neighbour's face. Suddenly Gabriel recalled what the miller had told him about the danger of leaving the stones unsupplied with grist. Like a flash he was down the ladder and across the littered floor to where the driving-belt was going its merry round. He took a stick that was lying close to his hand, and pushed the belt from one of the supporting pulleys; the belt hung limp, and the mill-wheel might turn as it would now for all Gabriel cared. The sweat was running off his face as he came back to Greta's side. "What is the matter? What have you been doing?" she asked, at a loss to account for this fresh perturbation of his. "Switching off the belt. Lass, if we had let those stones grind much longer, they would have blown the place up." "Blown the mill up? But how?" "They'd have grown hot enough to set fire to the dust between them--and that would have meant death to all in the house, Greta."