The footman, for once in his life, took his feet up, and ran in a bluster of rage and terror to the front door, which he had left wide open to secure a retreat from violence. Mr. Oglander struck his mare, and she started so that he scarcely pulled her head up under the coigne of his sister's porch. "What is all this, I would beg to know? If you think to frighten me, you are mistaken. Oh, Worth is it? Worth, whatever do you mean by making such a commotion?" Three or four frightened maids were peeping, safe in the gloom of the entrance-hall; while the lady of the house came forward bravely in the lamp-light. "I will speak to you presently, Joan," said the Squire, as he vainly searched, with a falling heart, for some dear face behind her. "Here, Bob, I know you at any rate; take the old mare to the stable." Then, with a sign to his sister, he followed her softly into the dining-room. At a glance he saw that she had dined alone, and he fell into a chair, and could not speak. "Have you brought back the stockings? Why, how ill you look? The cold has been too much for you, brother. You should not have come out. What was Grace doing to let----" "Where is my daughter Grace?" "Your daughter Grace! My niece Grace! Why, at home in her father's house, to be sure! Worth, are your wits wandering?" "When did Grace leave you?" "At three o'clock, yesterday. How can you ask, when you sent in such hot haste for her? You might be quite sure that she would not linger. I thought it rather--let me tell you----" "I never sent for Grace. I have not seen her!" Mrs. Fermitage looked at her brother steadily, with one hand fencing her forehead. She knew that he was of no drunken kind--yet once in a way a man might take too much--especially in such weather. But he answered her gaze with such eyes that she came up to him, and began to tremble. "I tell you, Joan, I never sent for Grace. If you don't know where she is--none but God knows!" "I have told you all," his sister answered, catching her breath at every word almost--"a letter came from you, overruling the whole of our arrangement--you were not ill; but you wanted her for some particular purpose. She was to walk, and you would meet her; and walk she did, poor darling! And I was so hurt that I would not send----" "You let her go, Joan! You let her go! It was a piece of your proud temper. Her death lies at your door. And so will mine!" Mr. Oglander was very sorry, as soon as he had spoken thus unjustly; but the deep pang of the heart devoured any qualms of conscience. "Are you sure that you let her go? Are you sure that she is not in this house now?" he cried, coming up to his sister, and taking both hands to be sure of her. "She must be here; and you are joking with me."