Rapid action was to Harry's taste. Within half an hour of the time he fell in with Jacob Tuttle few would have recognised in the smart, young, sailor-like-looking lad, the sedate London-dressed merchant's clerk. Harry felt freer than before in his new dress, and promising to return to old Dame Tuttle's cottage, he hurried away towards Stanmore. It was dusk when he approached the house; but he knew every path and sylvan glade in the grounds, and had already thought of the best place in which to watch for a chance of meeting Mabel. By climbing a high paling he got round to the garden side of the house. Lights were in several windows. He could, he thought, approach the drawing-room--Mabel might be there alone. He would then ask her to come out and talk with him. The most secure approach to it was by a long straight avenue overshadowed by trees which led up one side of the grounds. He hurried along it, keeping as much as possible on the turf on one side, that he might run no risk of making a noise, when he heard footsteps approaching, and presently a man's figure appeared in the centre of the walk. Who could it be? It might possibly, he thought, be the colonel, though it was not his custom to walk out at night. Harry drew behind a tree by which he was completely concealed. The person passed on, but so thick was the gloom that Harry could not distinguish his features. By his height it was certainly not the colonel. The person went up the avenue, then turned, and walked once more in the direction of the house. Harry did not move for fear of being discovered: he watched the person narrowly. A gleam of light came through an opening in the trees. He saw clearly the outline of the figure. His jealous feelings told him at once that it was the Baron de Ruvigny. "I thought he loved poor Lucy," he muttered to himself. "But Mabel! can it be to see her that he comes here? I might give her up for her own sake, but I would never yield her to a Frenchman." He came forward from his concealment, and confronted the young Frenchman. "We don't allow people in England to skulk about houses," he whispered, seizing the young man's arm. "Why, I know that voice--you are Harry Tryon. Surely you would not mock me?" answered the baron, not attempting to withdraw his arm from Harry's grasp. "Mock you! no; but what brings you here? I ask," exclaimed Harry. "I have a right to know that." "To indulge in my grief," answered the baron. "I have lost one who had won my deepest affections, and I come here, like an uneasy spirit, to wander over the ground on which she trod. Harry Tryon, I thought you knew how I loved her."