At length I summoned courage to speak to Rebecca Torkill. I told her I had seen Monsieur Droqville, and that I wanted her, without telling the servants at Dorracleugh, to make inquiry at the "George and Dragon," whether a person answering that description had been there. No such person was there. So I might assume he was gone. He had come with Sir Richard Mardykes, I conjectured, from Carsbrook, where he often was. But such a man was not likely to make even a pleasure excursion without an eye to business. He had, I supposed, made inquiries; possibly, he had set a watch upon me. Under the eye of such a master of strategy as Monsieur Droqville I could not feel quite at ease. Nevertheless, in a little time, such serenity as I had enjoyed at Dorracleugh gradually returned; and I enjoyed a routine life, the dulness of which would have been in another state of my spirits insupportable, with very real pleasure. We were now deep in winter, and in its snowy shroud how beautiful the landscape looked! Cold, but stimulating and pleasant was the clear, dry air; and our frost-bound world sparkled in the wintry sun. Old Sir Harry Rokestone, a keen sportsman, proof as granite against cold, was out by moonlight on the grey down with his old-fashioned duck-guns, and, when the lake was not frozen over, with two hardy men manoeuvring his boat for him. Town-bred, Mr. Blount contented himself with his brisk walk, stick in hand, and a couple of the dogs for companions to the town; and Mr. Marston was away upon some mission, on which his uncle had sent him, Mr. Blount said, to try whether he was "capable of business and steady." One night, at this time, as I sat alone in the drawing-room, I was a little surprised to see old Rebecca Torkill come in with her bonnet and cloak on, looking mysterious and important. Shutting the door, she peeped cautiously round. "What do you think, miss? Wait--listen," she all but whispered, with her hand raised as she trotted up to my side. "Who do you think I saw, not three minutes ago, at the lime-trees, near the lake?" I was staring in her face, filled with shapeless alarms. "I was coming home from Farmer Shenstone's, where I went with some tea for that poor little boy that's ailing, and just as I got over the stile, who should I see, as plain as I see you now, but Mr. Carmel, just that minute got out of his boat, and making as if he was going to walk up to the house. He knew me the minute he saw me--it is a very bright moon--and he asked me how I was; and then how you were, most particular; and he said he was only for a few hours in Golden Friars, and took a boat on the chance of seeing you for a minute, but that he did not know whether you would like it, and he begged of me to find out and bring him word. If you do, he's waiting down there, Miss Ethel, and what shall I say?"