The rain last night had washed the atmosphere so that even the most distant objects looked sharp and clearly defined. Away over the sea, the sun streamed down through a rift in the grey, low-hanging clouds, that widened out one minute till a glimpse of blue sky could be seen beyond it, and the next contracted its fleecy walls again till nothing was left save a thin shaft of blinding light that smote the water like a golden spear. Faint resinous odours were wafted fitfully from the plantation; in the hollows of the footpaths tiny pools of rain-water shivered in the cool September wind. Ella seemed in a peculiarly happy mood. Why she should be so she could not have explained even to herself, for had not Conroy told her that he was about to go away for an indefinite length of time, and was not the echo of Hubert Stone's mysterious words ringing in her memory? But so it was. She could no more account for her gladness than a child can for its fondness for play. Had she any faintest premonition, had her heart secretly warned her that a momentous instant was at hand? Be that as it may, Ella found fifty different things to talk about, and seemed nervously anxious not to let the conversation flag for a moment. She had all sorts of questions to ask about Spain, the country and the people, as though she had never read a book about it in her life. She hoped that Conroy would not run into any unnecessary danger, and now and then at intervals he must send her a little sketch of some place that he had visited, just to prove to her that he was still alive. She had often had an idea that she should like to learn Spanish, and had been told that it was nearly as musical as Italian. She would buy a grammar and dictionary at once; it would be a capital occupation for the long evenings of the coming winter; and when Mr. Conroy should return in spring she should doubtless be able to greet him in the choicest Castilian. Suddenly Ella paused in her talk to stand still. The clock over the Hall stables was striking the hour. "I did not suppose it was so late," she exclaimed. "I should have thought that the old clock was an hour fast, but that I know how painfully accurate it always is. We had better return. After what happened yesterday, Mrs. Toynbee may be sending the bellman round the village to cry me as lost." "Give me ten minutes more, and then we will go," said the young man. "Who can tell when we shall see each other again?" Ella tacitly assented, and they took a turn or two in silence. All her high spirits seemed suddenly to have deserted her. "Before leaving you I have a few words to say to you: it was to say them that I have come all the way from London,"--and Conroy took one of her hands in his as he spoke thus, even as he had taken it last evening in the boat. Ella's heart gave a great bound, she drew in her breath with a half sigh and trembled from head to foot.