Rob did not say a word--he hurried after her, with long strides, keeping up with her as she flew along, in her fright, by the hedge-row. “Oh, they must have missed me by this time. They will be wondering where I have been,” she said, breathless. Rob set his teeth in the dark. Never in his life had he been so humiliated. Though she had pledged herself to him, she was not thinking of him; and in all the experiences of his life he had never yet known this supreme mortification. He had been loved where he had wooed. The other girls whom Rob had addressed had forgotten everything for him. He half hated her, though he loved her, and felt a fierce eagerness to have her--to make her his altogether--to snatch her from the great people who looked down upon him--to make himself master of her fate. But this furious kind of love was only the excitement of the moment. At the bottom of his heart he was fond of Margaret (as he had been of other Margarets before). He could not bear the idea of losing her, of parting from her like this, in wild haste, without any of the lingering caresses of parting. “Is this how you are going away from me, Margaret,” he cried, “flying--as if you were glad to part, not sorry, when we don’t know when we may meet again?” “Oh, it is not that I am glad; it is only that they will wonder--they will not know where I have been.” “Will you ever be as breathless running to me as you are to run away from me?” he cried. “Stop, Margaret! one moment before we come near the gate, and say good-bye.” She yielded with panting breath. That sacred kiss of parting--which, to do him justice, he gave with all the fervor that became the occasion, giving, as he felt, his very heart with it--how glad she was to escape from it, and run on! “Oh no! I will not forget-- I could not forget!” she cried. Who was this, once more in the lovers’ way? A dark figure, who, they could see, by the movement of his head, turned to look at them, but; went on without taking any notice. Margaret, anxious as she was, recognized Randal Burnside, and wondered that he did not notice her, then was glad to think that he could not know her. Rob had other thoughts. “Again found out--and by the same fellow!” he said to himself, and gnashed his teeth. Randal was going over to Earl’s-hall, a familiar visitor, while he, the betrothed husband of the daughter of Earl’s-hall, had to skulk about the house in the dark, and take leave of his love under cover of the night. Not without bitter humiliations was this hour of his triumph. “We must wait till he is out of sight,” he said, hoarsely, holding her back. It was like holding an eager greyhound in the leash. “Oh, Margaret,” he said, and despite and vexation filled his heart, “you are not thinking of me at all--and here we have to part! You were not in such a hurry when you used to cry upon my shoulder, and take a little comfort from my love!”