But one bed, at least, in the royal house remained cold and unoccupied--Mary Hamilton had never returned home all night. Under the castle wall she kept her weary watch; and, as the dawn widened into day, she was still pacing hurriedly up and down, up and down, and at every fresh turn casting a horror-stricken look towards the sky. Presently the mist rolled slowly away, curling downwards from the heights of Craigton and the bleak outline of Drum-Carro Hill, disclosing the bare and cheerless table-land that forms the eastern boundary of Fife. The changing wind cleared the loaded atmosphere, and glimpses of blue became apparent through the fleecy vapours dispersing rapidly as they were driven out to sea; already the beams of morning were gilding the sands of the bay, and two or three fishing-boats, hoisting their white sails, were putting out hopefully from the shore; the cheery voices of the sailors came pleasantly over the water, and reached the ears of the watcher under the castle wall. Still the hood was drawn over her face; still she paced with that monotonous tread up and down, up and down; still the poor fool, crouching under his buttress, moaned and rocked and shivered, urging pitifully that he was ‘wantin’ hame--wantin’ hame.’ Then, though the castle yet remained a huge black mass in deep shadow, spire and pinnacle on the cathedral began to blush and glow in the morning sun; presently, when Mary Hamilton turned in her walk, her eye was dazzled by his horizontal beams streaming along a pathway of molten gold as he rose cloudless from the sea. Retracing her steps, she saw the whole massive building before her shine out at once in a flood of warm yellow light; then she stopped short, bending forward with her hand outstretched, and listening eagerly. Comforted by the warmth, the fool rose from his lair and rubbed his hands together, with an attempt at cheerfulness, shifting alternately from one foot to the other in a kind of measured dance, and striving in his vacant, half-witted manner to attract the attention of his companion. She neither moved nor noticed him; still in the same attitude, with her neck bent forward, her hand stretched out, and the lower part of her face visible beneath her hood, white and rigid as if cut from marble. He pulled her cloak impatiently--‘Come awa’ hame,’ he whimpered like a child left alone in the dark. ‘I’m feared here--I’m feared here; it’s no sae canny sin’ the dawn. Wi’ a rising wind, And a tide comin’ in, There’s a death to be; When the wind’s gaed back, An’ the tide’s at the slack, There’s a spirit free.’