She looked around her in the darkness toward the way by which she had come, really frightened for the first time that evening as at the palpable presence of sin. For a moment she hesitated in her intention to go forward. She had seen enough to convince her. There was no need of more. But the real object of her mission nerved her to her task. She must go on at once if she wished to reach the Tower in time to conceal herself. So she pressed her horse along the hill, and when she had crossed the ridge rode down in a path parallel to the edge of the cliffs, which brought her after a while into a line with Beaufort Head, where she could see the dim mass of the ruin rising above the chaos of rock that surrounded it. When she reached a spot not too far distant, she dismounted in a clump of bushes and fastening the bridle of her horse to the gnarled limb of a stunted tree, crept forward on foot. The excitement of the venture and its possible consequences now gave her renewed strength and caution. Moving to the left, toward the northern side of the Tower, she clambered over the rocks toward the sea. There should be plenty of time to reach a place of concealment before the occupant of the boat had time to climb the steep and tortuous path from the landing, and peering from side to side, pausing from time to time to listen, she reached the shadow of Table Rock, a huge slab of granite which had been tossed by some convulsion of Nature upon the very summit of the Head. The physical contours of the place made her approach an easy one, for the cliffs were strewn with bowlders and it was easy to slip from one to another without detection. Assured that the spot that she had reached was as near the Tower as she dared approach for the present, she wedged herself into a crevice between two rocks, into which she might pass and go out by the other side, and sank down upon her knees and waited. The moments passed slowly. Where was John Rizzio? Would Cyril never come? She had a moment of horror in the thought that the German messenger might come and discover her before Cyril arrived. What would he do to her? Kill her, of course. And in a panic of sinking nerves she thought of getting to her feet and fleeing into the friendly darkness from which she had come. She had even risen and her head was just below the level of the top of her refuge when she heard footsteps close by and got the odor of a cigarette. So she sank back, her hand at her heart to quiet its throbbings.