But Red Ratcliffe came too late to cross Mistress Wayne’s path, though he was riding out of the Wildwater gates at the moment, bent on seeing to the disposal of the body which lay in the Marshcotes tavern. As Janet was half toward home, he passed her at the gallop, but an ugly smile was all his greeting and he went by without once slackening pace. The girl misliked his silence; it was his way to bluster with her at each new opportunity, and a score of shapeless fears went with her as she hurried back to bear her grandfather company at dinner. What was old Nicholas planning when he had sent her out of hall this morning? Bloodshed and unrest were in the air; the whole wide moor seemed throbbing with an undernote of tumult, and Shameless Wayne had but the one life to lose. _But the one life to lose_—the thought maddened her. Real danger, danger that stood before her in the road and spoke its purpose plainly, she could meet unflinchingly; but the perils that waited on Wayne’s steps were formless and unnumbered. She would not think of them, and to ease her mind she turned again to thoughts of Red Ratcliffe, his mad passion, his cruelty and unruliness. "Christ, how I hate him—how I hate him!" she cried between set teeth, as she passed through the Wildwater gates. Red Ratcliffe, meanwhile, was riding hot and fast. His cousin’s scorn, of which he had had full measure earlier in the day, flicked him on the raw all down the road to Marshcotes; and his thoughts dwelt less on the brother for whom he was going to order a grave than on the fierce, quick-witted lass whom he had sworn to wed. He was in no good mood, accordingly, when he reached Marshcotes and drew rein at the Sexton’s door. The Sexton’s wife, hearing the sound of horse-hoofs on the road without, hobbled to the window and thrust her face between the plants that lined the sill. Her eyes went hard and her mouth turned downward as she saw who was her visitor. She was in no better mood, indeed, than Red Ratcliffe himself; for she had been up betimes after her long ringing of the death-bell, and the hundred-and-one bits of housework she had got through had not been lightened by the discovery of Mistress Wayne’s flight. It was no welcome hospitality that she had given to Wayne’s faithless wife; but it was hospitality for all that, and it troubled the old woman no little that her guest should have wandered, none knew whither. So tart her mood was, indeed, that the Sexton had long since been driven forth of doors by the goodwife’s tongue, and had taken refuge in the graveyard which was working-ground and home in one to the gentle man of dreams. "Is Witherlee in the house?" cried Ratcliffe, catching sight of Nanny’s face between the window-plants. The little old woman came to the door and stood there, arms akimbo. "He isn’t," she answered, looking steadfastly at the horse’s ears. "Then where is he? I must have a word with him before I go back to Wildwater."