"We shall soon see," said he, "whether your account of yourself is true or not, for we are going to the Castle. Now tell me, how long do you say you have left it?" "About half an hour, sir," replied the man, resuming a certain degree of courage on finding that he was not injured; "about half an hour, sir; and I can tell you that my lord will be mighty angry when he finds you have stopped me, and brought me back. He will make the house too hot to hold you, and the county too, that I'll warrant. You don't know whom you have got to deal with. He suffers no one to do anything but what he likes." "Is the Earl of Danemore still up?" demanded the stranger, calmly, taking not the slightest heed of the other's intimation. "Yes, that he is, and will not be in bed for these two hours, as you will find to your cost, perhaps, when he hears you have stopped me," answered the groom, firmly believing that what was awful to him must be equally so to every one else. "Does he not usually go to rest sooner?" asked the stranger again. "I understood that the whole household were required to be in bed by eleven, and I was afraid that we might have to rouse the porter to give us admittance." "Ay, he generally does go to bed at eleven," answered the groom, "but he has not done so to-night. You will have to rouse the porter, however, and most of the other servants too; for old John came out, growling and swearing at me, in his shirt, when I made him open the gates." "He must not swear at us, though," replied the other quietly, but in a tone which moved the groom's astonishment even more than anything which had passed before, so little reverence did his captors show either for the awful name of the Earl of Danemore or any of his dependants. As the other ceased, however, and did not resume the conversation, he had no choice but to accompany him in silence; and, followed by the rest of the party, they proceeded slowly on the road, which was evidently well known to the leader, now winding in and out amongst the high banks and woods, now crossing scattered pieces of the heath and moor-land, till at length they arrived at that spot under the walls of the park where, as we have mentioned in describing the forced journey of Langford, Danemore Castle, with its wide extent of park and woods, became first visible to the eye of any one travelling on the road from Moorhurst to the county town. There the leader of the party halted, and suffering his hands to drop thoughtfully upon the saddle-bow, he gazed up towards the spot where the Castle stood. At that dark hour, however, nothing was to be perceived but the masses of tall trees with which the building itself was confounded in undistinguished shade, except, indeed where a single spot of light was seen gleaming like a beacon, marking that there was the habitation of some human beings amongst the dark and awful-looking blackness which the scene otherwise presented.