Fanny drew the hood of her cloak about her and waited in mute expectancy, her eyes fixed on the point whence the sound had come. Nearer came the footsteps--only in the intense midnight quietude could they have been heard--and presently round a curve of the path advanced a female figure, also, like Fanny, darkly cloaked; but, for all that, one glance was enough to reveal to the latter the identity of the new-comer. It was impossible to mistake either figure or gait for those of anyone save Denia Melray. Fanny, with an arm flung round one of the beams that supported the windlass and with her other hand pressed to her bosom, watched the lithe, graceful figure pass her hiding-place and disappear round a curve of the walk a little further on. Three or four seconds later came the sound of a low whistle, which was immediately responded to by another whistle. Then, as in a flash, Fanny recalled to mind that, among other knick-knacks suspended from a chatelaine which the young widow occasionally wore, was a tiny silver dog-whistle, which had struck her as being a somewhat incongruous ornament for a person to carry who acknowledged to never having owned a dog in her life. Now, in the direction which Denia had taken was the one door by which admittance could be had to the garden from the outside; consequently, when a peculiar grating sound presently made itself heard, Fanny at once came to the conclusion that Mrs. Melray was at that moment withdrawing the bolts of the door in question. Who was her midnight visitor? Fanny's heart beat painfully. On the threshold of what mystery had she unwittingly found herself? Evidently a change of weather was impending. By this time a fine gauzy mist had overspread the upper reaches of the sky, through which the moon shone with a chastened lustre. The evergreens babbled softly to each other of the rain that was soon to come. Presently a sound of voices reached the ears of the waiting girl, those of a man and a woman talking together in low tones, and then, half a minute later, the speakers came round a turn of the path and so towards the well-house, he with an arm round her waist and with his other hand holding one of hers pressed close to his breast. Then, while the two were still some distance away, something in the man's walk, or figure, or his way of carrying himself, revealed his identity. "It is Richard Dyson!" exclaimed Fanny to herself, with a thrill that set every nerve tingling. "Oh, blind, blind that I have been!"