It was plain that for the moment, in place of being eager to resume her cast-off rank and state, Lady Bell had forgotten where and why she was going, and everything about Squire Trevor and his danger. It was only when the chaise rolled off, and she sank back in her corner, that she withdrew into herself to face the grim record of the bond she had broken, and the forfeit she was called on to pay. It was on a fresh summer morning, when, having started early to accomplish the last stage of their journey, Lady Bell and Mrs. Sundon came in sight of Trevor Court. The gates were standing open; early as it was, the lodge seemed deserted, so that the chaise entered without parley. The dew was lying like pearls on the grass by the drive, and silvering the yews on the terrace. The spirals of smoke from the red chimney-stacks were rising straight in the clear air. A gush of birds’ song sounded far and wide. There was something light, bright, and exhilarating in the air, and in the aspect of nature, which lent a peculiar charm to what was imposing in the pile of building and its grounds. “I have not seen Trevor Court before, save from a distance,” Mrs. Sundon let fall the remark. “You never told me, Lady Bell, what a fine old place it was.” “I don’t think I ever noticed it till the last time I saw it,” Lady Bell replied almost in a whisper; she recalled vividly that last time sitting on the September morning in the travelling chariot beside its master, who lingered in taking a short leave of his treasure. The next moment Lady Bell gave a shriek and put her hands before her face. The chaise had turned into the sweep before the house, where, in sombre contrast to the summer morning, the windows were all shrouded, and the hatchment was up. CHAPTER II. FREED BY THE VISITATION OF GOD. It was as a quailing widow, and not as a reluctant wife, that Lady Bell re-entered the old oak parlour, where she still trembled lest she should hear her husband’s loud, rough accents stuttering with rage, and his stick, when gout confined him to his chair, savagely beating the floor. Mrs. Walsh, in her towering cap and starched frill, received Lady Bell, and spoke to the point, without softening or reservation. “Yes, it is all over, Lady Bell, the Squire died last night at ten o’clock. He was took with a jaundice on Wednesday se’en night; but no danger was apprehended till five days ago, when Mr. Walsh writ the notice for the papers—to no purpose, so far as the Squire’s desiring to see and speak with you once more was concerned. You and he will not see and speak with each other on this side of the judgment day.”