"I trust so, my dear Lady Eversleigh. I shall hurry to Sir Oswald immediately, and in the meantime they have sent from the tower for medical help." "I must go to him!" said Honoria, wildly. "Call the servants, Mr. Carrington! My carriage--this moment!" She could scarcely utter the words in her excitement. Her voice had a choking sound, and but for the surgeon's supporting arm she must have fallen prone on the grass at his feet. As she clung to his arm, as she gasped out her eager entreaties that he would take her to her husband, a faint rustling stirred the underwood beneath some sycamores at a little distance, and curious eyes peered through the foliage. Lydia Graham had happened to stroll that way. Her curiosity had been excited by the absence of Lady Eversleigh from among her guests, and, being no longer occupied by her flirtation with the young viscount, she had set out in search of the missing Honoria. She was amply rewarded for her trouble by the scene which she beheld from her hiding-place among the sycamores. She saw Victor and Lady Eversleigh talking to each other with every appearance of agitation; she saw the baronet's wife clinging, in some wild terror, to the arm of the surgeon; and she began to think that Honoria Eversleigh was indeed the base and guilty wretch she would fain have represented her. Lydia Graham was too far from the two figures to hear a word that was spoken. She could only watch their gestures, and draw her own inferences therefrom. "My carriage, Mr. Carrington!" repeated Honoria; "why don't you call the servants?" "One moment, Lady Eversleigh," said the surgeon, calmly. "You must remember, that on such an occasion as this, there is nothing so important as presence of mind--self-command. If I alarm your servants, all the guests assembled here will take the alarm; and they will rush helter-skelter to Yarborough Tower, to testify their devotion to Sir Oswald, and to do him all the harm they possibly can. What would be the effect of a crowd of half-drunken men, clustering round him, with their noisy expressions of sympathy? What I have to propose is this: I am going to Sir Oswald immediately in my medical capacity. I have a gig and horse ready, under that group of fir-trees yonder--the fastest horse and lightest vehicle I could find. If you will trust yourself in that vehicle behind that horse, I will drive you across the moor, and we shall reach the ruins in half an hour. Have you courage to come with me thus, Lady Eversleigh, quietly, unobserved by any one?--or will you wait for your barouche; and wait until the revellers yonder are all ready to start with you?" The voices came loudly from the marquee as the surgeon spoke; and Honoria felt that he spoke wisely.