Even as Roland was quoting these lines to Annot Drummond a wonderful but natural effect took place. 'Look, Roland,' cried she with a thrill of real terror; 'look, the chapel is on fire!' 'Oh, impossible,' said he, still intent on gazing on her sweet face. 'But look--look--it _is_!' Whether she thought so or not Annot was evidently startled and discomposed, while Roland certainly was not without momentary astonishment. A row of red lights appeared through the branches of the dark trees high above where he and Annot stood. It was the last light of the orange and blood-red set sun gleaming though the double row of chapel windows--the rich red light that is peculiar to Scottish sunsets, and the phenomenon it produced had a powerful effect upon the vision and minds of the beholders--even on the volatile and unimaginative Annot, who, before the light faded out, was not slow to understand and to utilize the situation in her own way. She clung to Roland in an access of terror apparently, and that it was more than partly simulated certainly he never thought. While seeming to be terrified by the ghostly sight, she hid her face in his neck; and then Roland felt it was all over with him! 'My darling--my darling, do not be so alarmed--it is only a transient sunset effect,' said he, kissing her cheek. 'Don't, Roland, don't--oh, you must not do that,' she murmured. But Roland did _that_, again and again--pressing his lips to her eyes, her rippling hair--covering her face with kisses, while he half lifted, half led her homeward, up the steep and winding path to Merlwood, which they reached, as said, at a somewhat later period than usual. 'Well,' thought Hester, as she bathed her face and eyes to remove all traces of her late emotion, 'in three days I shall, for a time at least, see and hear no more of this. And yet--my heart will speak--I have loved _him_--all my life--ever since he was a boy; and she has known him, as it were, but yesterday!' She put a hand to her forehead and pushed back the rings and rows of heavy brown hair, as if their weight oppressed her. 'Thank Heaven!' she thought, 'I can make my life a useful and a busy one, even here. Thank Heaven for the refuge of another love, with work and duty--love and duty to papa, and work for my poor people and their little ones! But why, oh why,' she added, while interlacing her fingers behind her neck, and looking round her wildly, 'did he love her after _all_?--why turn from me to her--that little golden-haired doll, with her winning ways and heartless nature; and how comes it that her languorous green eyes have power to awake such a passion as filled every accent of Roland's voice in the gloaming there? She came when she was not wanted; and both are cruel, heartless, treacherous!'