And true it was that at certain times—oftenest when the air was still, and dusk of late evening or dark of night brooded quiet over house and garden—a wild music would sweep down the lane, not crisp and sharp-defined, but softened like the echo of a hound’s baying far away. The hardier folk were wont to laugh at Barguest, with a backward turn of the head to make sure he was not close behind them, and these vowed that the Brown Dog of Marsh was no more than the voice of the stream which ran in a straitened channel underneath the road; water had strange tricks of mimicry, they said, when it swept through hollow places, and the deep elfin note that haunted Barguest lane was own brother to many a bubbling cry and groan that they had hearkened to amongst the stream-ways of the moor. And this son of talk was well enough when treacle posset was simmering on some tap-room hearth; but abroad, and especially if gloaming-tide surprised them within hail of old Marsh House, they found no logic apt enough to meet their terror of the Spectre Hound. As for the Waynes, there were some among them who pretended to disclaim their guardian Dog; yet there was not one who would oust tradition from his veins—not one who failed to loosen his sword-blade in the scabbard if any told him that Barguest had lately given tongue. The spirit of the homestead was strong on Shameless Wayne to-night, as he sat alone in the hall, watching the dead and thinking his own remorseful thoughts. All that was left of his father rested, gaunt and still, on the bier in the centre of the hall, where it was laid out in state with candles burning low at head and feet. Mistress Nell and the serving-wenches were all in the back part of the house; the lads had not returned from hawking in the lowland pastures; the last of the day’s visitors had bidden the corpse farewell and had gone home again, leaving the new master of Marsh House to watch the closed eyes of his forerunner. A ray of fading sunlight crept across the hall and rested on the dead man’s face, which showed white as the cere-cloth that bound his jaws. "Father, father!" he cried, laying one hand on the waxen cheek. "Do you know what chanced yesternight? Do you know that I, who should have carried the quarrel, sat drinking your honour and my own away?—God, I could see each Wayne of them all look askance at me to-day, as they came and stood beside you here. And each man was saying to himself, ’There is none of the old breed left at Marsh.’ They were right, father—and sometimes, when the candle-shadows play about your face, I seem to see you laughing at thought of Shameless Wayne—laughing to know him for your son."