He perceived the effect which his first gift had produced, and he saw also how earnestly she listened to his words. He wore a golden repeater, which he had purchased in Geneva, and which was secured by a chain of the same metal, that went round his neck. He placed the chain around her neck, he pressed the watch upon her bosom. In her bosom she heard, she felt it beat, while her own heart beat more rapidly. "Hark!--hark!" said he, "how constantly it beats upon your breast--yet, trust me, loved one, my heart beats more truly for you." Before they parted, another assignation was arranged. From that period, frequent interviews took place between Walter and the lovely Judith, and at each visit he brought her presents, and adorned her person with ornaments. Her parents knew of his addresses, but they forbade them not. Now, one evening they had taken up their abode in a deserted building near to Twisel Bridge; and thither the young laird came to visit Judith. Her father invited him into what had once been an apartment in the ruined building, and requested him to sup with them. Walter consented; for the love he bore to Judith could render the coarsest morsel sweet. But, when he beheld the meat that was to be prepared and placed before him, his heart sickened and revolted, for it consisted of part of a sheep that had died; and, when Lussha beheld this, he said, "Wherefore shudder ye, young man, and why is your heart sick? Think ye not that the flesh o' the brute which has been slain by the hand o' its Creator, is fitter for man to eat than the flesh o' an animal which man has butchered?"[2] [Footnote 2: Gipsies always assign this as a reason for their preferring the flesh of animals that have died to that of such as are slaughtered.--ED.] Walter had not time to reply; for, as Lussha finished speaking, a dog bounded into the ruins amongst them. Judith started from the ground; she raised her hands, her eyes flashed with horror. "Ah!" she exclaimed, in a voice of suppressed agony, "it is Gemmel's--Gemmel's hound! Fly, Walter, fly!" "Wherefore should I fly?" returned the youth; "think ye, Judith, I am not able to defend myself and you against any man? Let this fierce braggart come." "Away!--haste ye away, sir!" said Lussha, earnestly, grasping him by the arm, "or there will be blood and dead bodies on this floor! Come away! Gemmel Græme is at hand, and ye dinna ken him sae weel as I do!" Walter would have remonstrated, but the gipsy, still grasping him by the arm, dragged him to a door of the ruin, adding, "Steal away--quick! quick among the trees, and keep down by the Till to Tweedside. Dinna speak!--away!" It was a grey midnight in July, and the heir of Riccon had not been absent three minutes, when Gemmel Græme stalked into the ruin, and with his arms folded sat down upon a stone in sullen silence. "We are glad to see ye, Gemmel," said Mariam; "ye hae been an unco stranger." "Humph!" was his brief and cold reply.