During all this strange courtship the ordinary caresses, in which lovers freely indulge, had been few indeed. Now, to-day, when Fate seemed propitious, their caresses were less restrained, and, for the first time, Raife kissed Gilda passionately. The fire of youthful kisses will destroy discretion. The sight of a neatly-costumed nurse being passionately embraced by the youthful owner of Aldborough Park would have made an interesting film for a cinema. In real life the casual or accidental witness of such a scene, is liable to be shocked. In this instance the genial old landlord of the "Blue Boar" was ascending the stairs, and saw sufficient of the impassioned incident, through a mirror, to encourage him to give a loud and friendly cough. The process of disentanglement was instant and complete. Most of us are familiar with it. With a discreet tap at the door, which had been, with an inadvertence which was frequent on such occasions, left partly open, the old man announced: "If you please, Sir Raife, Lady Remington is coming upstairs and would like to see you." Raife merely exclaimed, in a tone that indicated panic, and the exclamation consisted of one word only--a characteristically English utterance, "What!" Hastily pushing the old man out of the room, and, closing the door, he stood for a moment bewildered. Then Raife ejaculated in short, disjointed sentences: "Good heavens! The mater! What brings her here? How did she know?" Gilda stood calmly. She had been well trained to avoid panic in an emergency. A man ceases to be an aristocrat when he allows panic to be more than momentary. Sir Raife Remington, Bart., was an aristocrat. Gilda's practised eye looked at the window and calculated the drop. With a discretion inherited through generations of "service," Twisegood had descended the old staircase. Lady Remington, with the instinct of a mother, ascended the staircase. Her rather "exalted" tones sounded from without: "Is this the room, Twisegood?" Her hand was upon the handle of the door. Then did inspiration seize Raife. Whispering hurriedly: "You go down this staircase," pointing to the secret exit, "into the loose box at the bottom and wait your chance." To Gilda, who had shown such dexterity in descending by a silken rope from the library window at Aldborough Park, it was easy to find a "way out" by a staircase, even if it did lead her into a loose box in a stable! When Lady Remington explained that the horse in her brougham had cast a shoe, and that Twisegood's man was attending to it--and that Twisegood had said that Sir Raife was upstairs, it became easier to understand why Lady Remington was climbing those stairs at that unpropitious moment. Sir Raife expressed his opinion of affairs to Twisegood at a later date. CHAPTER FOURTEEN. HAUNTED BY THE SPIRIT OF THE RIVER.