But Miles had no thought otherwise; while Marmaduke stood in a species of panic, which rendered further effort for an instant vain, the other strode to the door near which he stood, and, flinging the dog forth, calmly turned the key, and placed it in his pocket. This act alarmed Marmaduke; there is something to the cowardly man fearful in the calm of a resolute one. He turned hastily to fly, his hand was on the lock of the door leading to the corridor, but another's reached his before he turned it, and, without one uttered word, he felt his nerveless grasp withdrawn. The key grated in the lock beneath Miles's fingers; he saw him, too, with perfect composure, look around, and then, a feat of child's play to him, tear down the bell-rope, to prevent the possibility of Marmaduke's summoning assistance; this done, Miles turned calmly round to where his cousin stood. Mary had dropped, powerless to stand, in a chair, and, with eyes distended by terror, watched every movement of the quiet desperation Miles portrayed. "Now," he said, in untrembling resolution, as he fixed his eyes on his cousin, the stern brow knit over their intense gaze, "retraction full, and immediate!" "Of what?" asked the other, endeavouring to seem calm and unconscious. "Of 'impostor,' and 'base-born hound!'" "Do you call it a noble act, to enter, as you have done this evening here, with the connivance of that traitress, and play eavesdropper?" cried Marmaduke, endeavouring to evade the demand of _retraction_ of his tongue's hasty aspersion. "Tis false, that too!" answered Miles. "I followed this girl, 'tis true; I feared she might be again led to attempt suicide,--I saw her enter by the shrubbery gate,--strangely enough, I, too, had purposed visiting you this night by that entrance, to which I also have a key," (he held one up as he spoke,) "mine, since when we often entered thereby together, cousin Marmaduke. But I had intended my visit to have been made some hours later, deeming that possibly the hospitable lord of the manor-house might keep open house for his numerous friends, whose pleasures I would not have interrupted for worlds. My business is of a private nature; but, as she entered, I followed, and, knowing all the intricacies of the old place, why, I came by the private stair to the adjoining rooms; these rooms were mine!" The man's voice slightly trembled as he uttered these words; for, in looking round, his eye rested on the old mandolin; it awakened a chord in his heart, not like its own--broken. Marmaduke perceived this emotion, and deemed it an advantage gained, not having seen whence arose that softened tone; but Mary had seen, and her eye following his, the tears gathered in a heavy cloud over her vision, as she looked up to the thing to which she had often danced, a light-hearted child; for her heart was now as powerless of joy as the mandolin of tone; error and death had worked their will in stilling both.