'Hist!' she whispered. 'The boy's not gone! Whillaloo! 'Twas the baker that escaped! It's at Strogue he is this cursed minute. The candle's there, the moth is booming round it! Maybe there's time still. Bid him be off, jewel, do; and I'll keep watch lest any come. Jug's looking out on the back road.' 'Murther!' ejaculated Curran, wide awake now. 'They're scouring the country for him. Oh, the silly lad!' And beating his pony with unwonted vehemence, the lawyer galloped through the park-gates, along the short turn of avenue which led to the Abbey, and, leaving the astonished animal to recover how he could, hurried up the steps into the hall. The door was idly swinging, but no one was visible in the vestibule nor in the dining-room, nor in Miss Wolfe's boudoir. Hark! Subdued voices, murmuring further on, in the tapestry-saloon. He moved quickly thither, and, standing on the threshold, stamped his feet in the impotent fury of his wrath. There was Robert--haggard and unkempt--still in the pinchbeck uniform, torn and bespattered now, with a peasant's frieze-coat thrown over it--a ridiculous disguise. He was kneeling by a couch whereon lay Sara, her face turned towards him, her eyes fixed full on his with a wild unreasoning longing, while he chafed her hands and kissed them. The tall and graceful figure of Doreen leaned against the sculptured garlands of the mantelpiece, as she gave the homage of silent sympathy to the voiceless parting of this pair, while her mind wandered in the cypressed graveyard of her own sorrow. That heap of black satin, prone under the carriage-wheels, would never leave her memory so long as life should last. Stroke had succeeded stroke, and she winced no more. All three looked up when Curran stamped his feet, and Robert advanced towards him timidly. 'I have done wrong, terribly wrong, sir,' he said, with a sigh. 'I can make no atonement, except by laying down my life.' 'A useful sacrifice, truly!' the incensed lawyer rejoined. 'You don't think of _her_--whom you are killing!' 'The breath of the tomb is on me!' implored the lad, with a dry mouth. 'Spare any addition to my misery. I was infatuated, too certain of success, and knew she would be so glad when I succeeded. Those lives--those lives! Would success have blotted out the recollection of them? I go, and it is well that I should go, though I leave to so many a legacy of sorrow.' There was a dreamy resignation about the youth, as of one who does wrong and leaves others to bear the brunt, which infuriated Curran. If ever there was a moment for promptitude to the exclusion of dreaminess, this was that moment, for the sake of others as well as himself; and here he stood, soliloquising like a Hamlet--the unpractical dangerous dreamer!