The temptation proved too strong for the lovers to resist. Lucy foresaw no difficulty in carrying out her part of the scheme. Once a month her uncle, Barney Dale, went to Marrowfield, as he had done for the last quarter of a century, to dispose of the work of his mistress's needle. Three days hence was his time for going, and Dr. Hazeldine's exploration must take place while he was away. Breakfast would be over, and Miss Pengarvon, intent on her work in the Green Parlor, would hear nothing. As a further safeguard, however, it might be as well if the young doctor were to wear a pair of list slippers over his boots. As it was arranged so it was carried out. Clement was surreptitiously admitted at the side entrance about half-an-hour after Barney had taken his departure. Under the guidance of the girl he tramped upstairs and down in his list slippers, passing from one unused room to another, having here a shutter opened for him, so as to let in a modified daylight, and there a blind partly drawn up. Many of the rooms were entirely denuded of furniture, while in others what there was of it was sheeted up in brown holland. Everywhere the dust lay thick and heavy; the clouded mirrors could but reflect the ghosts, as it were, of the young man and the girl as they passed in front of them. Nearly every corner was festooned with huge cobwebs; behind the wainscoting the mice squeaked and scampered; everything was touched by the mouldering finger of decay. When Clement and his guide spoke to each other it was as people speak in the chamber of death.