A feeling of growing faintness did more than his friend’s injunctions in inducing Hilary to comply. Zephyr snorted and fidgeted. The difference between seven stone twelve and thirteen stone twelve was an appreciable one; but Stephen’s strong hand was on the bridle, and Zephyr’s mistress walked alongside, patting and caressing the animal, and reducing his nervous excitement into comparative quiet by the magic of her touch. Lord Carthew followed in silence until, the short cut between the trees becoming narrow, Miss Cranstoun stepped back, and he found himself beside her. It had grown too dark for him to see more than the outline of her slight figure and delicate profile as she walked behind the horse, lifting her riding-habit from the ground with the hand in which she carried her workmanlike-looking hunting-crop. “I cannot tell you how sorry I am about this accident,” she said, addressing Lord Carthew suddenly. “I am sure your friend meant to be kind. But I thought there was no one about, and I screamed in that silly way from sheer enjoyment. It isn’t riding that I care for, but _flying_. And I did not guess that any one would be in the woods so late, so I was just having a gallop before dinner. I have never been thrown in my life. I am never so happy or so comfortable as when I am on horseback, and unless Zephyr is going as fast as he can, neither he nor I enjoy ourselves. But I can understand that to strangers it might look dangerous. And I am dreadfully sorry about the accident to your friend. Will you tell me his name?” In this young girl’s whole manner there was something so simple, innocent, and frank that Claud was more than ever enchanted with her. That feeling of fate which had haunted him all through his recent tour was upon him now. Here were all the conditions of Kyro’s prophecy fulfilled. The lady whom he was to meet on a journey, and with whom he was to fall madly in love, was walking by his side, and speaking to him in a voice which went straight to his heart, awakening hitherto unknown chords of sweetness there. All the romance, the sentiment, and the poetry, dormant in the nature of this singular young man, started into life at the proximity of this charming creature, at once so daring as a rider, so maidenly and gentle as a woman. Here was an opportunity of applying his test. He remembered it, and said unhesitatingly, in answer to Miss Cranstoun’s question: “My friend is Lord Carthew.” “Oh!” It must have been fancy, he told himself, but her ejaculation seemed to express disappointment; and he noticed that she did not, when they struck into a wider path, walk as before by the side of the horse, but remained in the rear, much to his own secret satisfaction. “I am afraid we shall be disturbing your parents,” he said, after a few moments’ silence.