A wolf howled upon the hills without and the lingering, doleful cry, taken up by a thousand lifted throats, came upon the silence as the dead man's requiem. Arthur Kenyon shivered when he heard it and beat the fire down as though darkness were preferable to this aureole upon the staring face. When Gavin said "Hush," and bade him listen, he half turned, upon an impulse, toward the dead man as though the dead were about to speak. The terrible strain of that suspense had become insupportable. What mattered it since the end must be the same--sooner or later, to-night or to-morrow, the reckoning, the vengeance? He was young, and life might have much in store for him; but travel had taught him to say "Kismet" and he said it unflinchingly. "There would be snow on the hills," he cried at last, as though his thoughts were out there upon the lonely mountain road. Gavin, for answer, gripped him by the arm and forced him to listen. "Do you not hear!" he cried in a broken whisper; "some one is calling the Chevalier?" They bent together as though to hear more keenly. In the courtyard without, footsteps could now be heard and a voice crying, "Master, master!" The hour had come then! Here were those who sought them. "Will you speak to them, Gavin?" "Hush for God's sake--I must think, think----" "That's a second footstep--can't you hear it? My God, Gavin, what shall we do?" "Let me think, Arthur, let me think." He buried his face in his hands and could feel his temples throbbing. For Evelyn's sake, for her--ah, if that miracle of love could but come to pass! To open the gates, to defy the perils of the hills, to pass as in flight by towns, rivers, cities, the abodes of men, the lonely passes, the lights of towns, the storms of seas, to venture all for Evelyn's sake. If it could be that? The voice of reason answered, "Fool, the men are at the door." He rose excitedly from his chair and gripped his friend by the arm. "Tap the pavement," he said, "tap as the old Chevalier used to. I must think, Arthur--for God's sake now tap with the stick." Kenyon obeyed him as a child would have done. He tapped upon the stone floor with the stick but did not speak a word. Gavin had him by the arm now and appeared almost as one in a trance. His eyes were half-closed; he muttered to himself, stretching out his hand and feeling, as it were, for a path which the darkness would disclose to him. And the word upon his lips was "Evelyn"--oft repeated, as though she were near and did not hear him. "What are you going to do, Gavin?" "To lead you from this house, Arthur--do not speak to me; some one is calling us, Arthur." He passed out into the bare stone corridor leading to the banqueting hall. From the shadows one of the gypsies appeared with the swiftness of an apparition. He carried a lantern in his hand and lifted it while he spoke. "Master!" he cried, and then reeled back, the words broken upon his lips.