“Comed!” she repeated, “Aye, and maire nor him.” Our traveller threw his bridle to the gentle groom, whistled, advanced a foot over the threshold, and paused in the act, till he heard an answering whistle from within. He then proceeded, and entering a miserably small earthen-floored apartment, on the side of the passage, stood before Julia’s late conductor. This mysterious personage was still wrapped in his boat cloak. He sat leaning on a little rickety round table, whereon was placed a lantern which suffered but little of the light it contained to escape, having, in place of glass, sides of rusty tin, perforated with small holes like those of a colander. “You have secured her, then?” said the traveller, as he entered. “Where is Lord L.?” inquired the stranger, without rising or noticing the question put to him. “Pursuing on a wrong track,” replied the traveller. “Have you brought the title-deeds?” demanded the stranger, in a tone that few would have liked to have answered with a negative. The traveller unbuttoned his great coat and took off his hat. It was Henry! “I have,” he replied, after a moment of hesitation, and slowly undoing a button or two of the inner coat. “Give them to me, then!” said the stranger fiercely. Henry drew a parcel of parchments halfway from his breast, then paused. “What do you hesitate about, Sir?” said the stranger. “I do not mean,” commenced Henry, “to sell the Craigs at present.” “What of that?” said the stranger. “You shall have the half of the rents,” continued Henry, in an expostulating tone, “and when, at Lord L.’s death, she inherits her proportion of his estates, then the Scotch acres may go to the hammer, and you shall have the whole of the money they bring.” The stranger, while with his eyes fixed on the face of the speaker, he listened, had been slowly extracting a brace of pistols from his pockets, and laying them on the table. “And pray what security have I for all this unless the title-deeds are in my own possession?” he demanded scornfully, and with affected coolness. Then, with a sudden yell of rage, resembling the neigh of a wild horse, and grinning in a terrific manner, he vociferated, “Lay down the parchments, Sir!” striking the table as he spoke so violently with his clenched hand, that the lantern spun round like a child’s top; and one of the pistols leaping to the ground, went off. Henry took the packet from his breast, and laid it down in silence.