She settled herself in her place to watch if it were till doomsday, so determined did she seem; and meanwhile Hartley sat just inside the drawing-room, shrouded in complete darkness which accorded well with the blackness of spirit which was upon him. Leo could not reach her window without passing close to him, and he thought bitterly now of his simplicity in not grasping the meaning of torn-down growth and broken trellis by the summer-house. It was all plain enough now. Thought succeeded thought. He could grasp clearly enough the meaning of North's actions when he had attended Tom Candlish--how bitter he had seemed against him, and then the full light came. "Why, it must have been North who had surprised Tom Candlish, and beaten him within an inch of his life, and, oh! shame--the woman must have been Leo! "And every one must have known this but poor, weak, blind mole, Hartley Salis," he groaned. "Scoundrel! Base hound! Why, if I had been North!--but I'm forgetting myself," he said, as he pressed his hands to his throbbing brows, and felt that the veins in his temples were full and turgid. "Not a word to me! Well, how could he speak, and complain to me? Oh, shame, shame, shame!" The hot tears of indignation started to his eyes; the first that had been there for many years, and they seemed to scald him till he dashed them fiercely away. "I stand to her in the place of father," he muttered sternly; "and I'll do my duty by her, even if I have to keep her under lock and key." The time did not seem long, though he sat there for hours, so active was his brain, and so flooded with memories of Leo's early life--her wilful disobedience, her determined opposition even in childish things, and Salis felt that the woman was the same in spirit as the child had been, and that if Leo was to be reclaimed he must pursue a very different course in the future. All at once he started, for there was the faint chirp of a bird; then the loud _chink! chink_! of a blackbird, and he became on the alert, for it was the note uttered when the bird was alarmed. Day was close at hand, for there was a faint line of light in the east, and sure enough directly after there was a faint, rustling sound, as of a dress brushing against some bush; directly after--_ruff, ruff; ruff, ruff_--the rustling of the dress as its wearer walked quickly up the green path, as if in fear of being overtaken by the coming day. Then it seemed a little darker just in front of the drawing-room window; a shrub was blotted out by something black, which seemed to glide by--_ruff, ruff; ruff ruff_--and then there was a hard breathing, and the creak of a piece of lattice. For the moment, now that the time had arrived, Salis sat there quite overcome, and ready to let the opportunity pass.