"'Pshaw! silly Winifred, you need not thank me yet," replied the duchess, half turning away, and brushing off a tear; "you must not make me weep before I go to court, or my eyes will make no conquests to-night, and my lord duke, who loves to hear me praised, will be angry with you, fair cousin. I must stay with you no longer, or I shall play the very fool, and not be fit to show myself at St. James's. One kiss, dear cousin, and adieu! It would not be wise that I should absent myself from the king's presence just now. For your sake I must not linger;" and the fair creature moved away in grace and beauty. She glided through the hall; the splendid coach drove off; the running-footmen, bearing torches, preceded and accompanied her. "How unjust," thought Lady Nithsdale, "is the common accusation that pomp and splendour harden the heart! Where could I find more true kindness and sympathy than in my dear cousin Christian, whose life has been one sunny dream of unclouded brilliancy?" But as she slowly and thoughtfully returned in solitude to the temporary lodging which Amy had procured for her, she pondered on the duchess's words--"My lord has many enemies, she said: how can he have enemies? Surely, if favour is to be shown to any, to whom could it be more properly extended than to him? Does not the kind duchess alarm herself needlessly? And yet she knows the counsels of those in power. She would not wish to excite unreasonable fears in my mind. Alas! what can she mean? My lord was not one of the first to join the insurgents: Lord Derwentwater was already in arms; Forster was at the head of a considerable body of troops; the Earl of Mar had set up King James's standard. Neither had he, like the Earl of Mar, ever made professions of loyalty to the House of Hanover. General Forster is even now a member of King George's parliament. But my dear lord is not obnoxious from either of these causes. He has never been guilty of treachery, neither has he ever been forward in causing disturbances in his native land; but when civil broils became inevitable, then--then he was not found wanting to the family for which his ancestors have bled and suffered. Oh! would that the morrow were arrived! This long tedious night, which must intervene before I can see, learn, hear, know, do anything further, how wearisome, how irksome is it!" Upon her return to her lodgings, she found that Amy Evans, on her part, had not been idle. She had already sought and obtained an interview with her former companion Mrs. Morgan. Nearly ten years had elapsed since Mellicent Hilton had left the Welsh valley of her childhood as the bride of Mr. Morgan, and from that time the playfellows had never met; for before Mrs. Morgan returned to visit her father in his solitude, Amy had accompanied the Countess of Nithsdale into Scotland. Mrs. Morgan was fortunately alone on the evening in question, when Amy, half-alarmed at her own presumption, presented herself at her door.