The anniversary of Christabel's betrothal came round, St. Luke's Day--a grey October day--with a drizzling West-country rain. She went to church alone, for her aunt was far from well, and Miss Bridgeman stayed at home to keep the invalid company--to read to her and cheer her through the long dull morning. Perhaps they both felt that Christabel would rather be alone on this day. She put on her waterproof coat, took her dog with her, and started upon that wild lonely walk to the church in the hollow of the hills. Randie was a beast of perfect manners, and would lie quietly in the porch all through the service, waiting for his mistress. She knelt alone just where they two had knelt together. There was the humble altar before which they were to have been married; the rustic shrine of which they had so often spoken as the fittest place for a loving union--fuller of tender meaning than splendid St. George's, with its fine oaken panelling, painted windows, and Hogarthian architecture. Never at that altar, nor at any other, were they two to kneel. A little year had held all--her hopes and fears--her triumphant love--joy beyond expression--and sadness too deep for tears. She went over the record as she knelt in the familiar pew--her lips moving automatically, repeating the responses--her eyes fixed and tearless. Then when the service was over she went slowly wandering in and out among the graves, looking at the grey slate tablets, with the names of those whom she had known in life--all at rest now--old people who had suffered long and patiently before they died--a fair young girl who had died of consumption, and whose sufferings had been sharper than those of age--a sailor who had gone out to a ship with a rope one desperate night, and had given his life to save others--all at rest now. There was no grave being dug to-day. She remembered how, as she and Angus lingered at the gate, the dull sound of the earth thrown from the gravedigger's spade had mixed with the joyous song of the robin perched on the gate. To-day there was neither gravedigger nor robin--only the soft drip, drip of the rain on dock and thistle, fern and briony. She had the churchyard all to herself, the dog following her about meekly--crawling over grassy mounds, winding in and out among the long wet grass. "When I die, if you have the ordering of my funeral, be sure I am buried in Minster Churchyard." That is what Angus had said to her one summer morning, when they were sitting on the Maidenhead coach--and even West-End London, and a London Park, looked lovely in the clear June light. Little chance now that she would be called upon to choose his resting-place--that her hands would fold his in their last meek attitude of submission to the universal conqueror.