The woolly rascal rushed at his master, squirming and whining with delight, as he made playful snaps at the hand wherewith his said master was pulling his ears, and only flailing a couple of knick-knacks off a low table with his wagging brush. "Go now and dress, you people, or you'll be late, as usual," laughed Olive. It was essentially a family party, that which gathered round the dinner-table at Cranston that evening, and it was the anniversary of the sudden rolling away of that last and terrible cloud, which had lain so heavily on all concerned since last we saw them together. Dr Ingelow was there, genial, sunny-hearted, as of yore, and Margaret. Sophie, too, tyrannising over and teasing her _fiance_--none other than Frank Marsland, there at her side. Nellie Dorrien, however, is missing, and, in fact, is far enough away, for she is making her _debut_ in an Indian station as a bride of a month, Eustace Ingelow being there quartered. But they are all uncommonly lively, except that every now and then the recollection of Hubert's impending departure creates a momentary silence, for he has long been one of this circle, and they will miss him. From the repartee and laughter of the general conversation, Olive, sitting there, bright and winning as of old, at times drops out. The anniversary of this night rests in her memory still; so, too, does that other terrible night, when they went down into the Valley of the Shadow together--when they stood beneath the iron cliffs in the dim gloaming, and Death stared them in the face, and his grisly hand was over them, reached forth from the on-rushing thunder of raving surges. Both these ordeals had left their mark upon her, moulding her character, and bringing out the best of her nature, shining and durable. No cloud remained now. But--the Ban! More than a year had passed and gone since its last and grisly manifestation, but none had fallen victim. It was as though cheated. But further literary research on the legendary terror overshadowing his house had carried a reassuring conviction to the mind of Roland Dorrien, strange in the light of his utter and scoffing scepticism on the subject in former times. This was nothing less than a prophecy appended to the prophecy, and done out of the quaintly-spelt and worded phraseology of its period, this is how it ran: "All events befall in cycles. One woman consigned these two to the bloodless Death. Generations seven shall pass, and he of that time two women shall save from it. Then the Ban shall be removed and the bloodless Death shall depart from Craunston."