He walked on, however, without quickening his pace, waving very slightly from side to side his ebony walking-cane--thin as a pencil--as if it were a wand to beckon away the unseen things that haunt the darkness; and now he came upon the wider plateau, from which, the close copse receding, admitted something more of the light, faint as it was, that lingered in the heavens. A tall gray stone stands in the centre of this space. There had once been a boundary and a stile there. Stanley knew it very well, and was not startled as the attorney was the other night when he saw it. As he approached this, some one said close in his ear, 'I beg your pardon, Master Stanley.' He cowered down with a spring, as I can fancy a man ducking under a round-shot, and glanced speechlessly, and still in his attitude of recoil, upon the speaker. 'It's only me, Master Stanley--your poor old Tamar. Don't be afraid, dear.' 'I'm _not_ afraid--woman. Tamar to be sure--why, of course, I know you; but what the devil brings you here?' he said. Tamar was dressed just as she used to be when sitting in the open air at her knitting, except that over her shoulders she had a thin gray shawl. On her head was the same close linen nightcap, borderless and skull-like, and she laid her shrivelled, freckled hand upon his arm, and looking with an earnest and fearful gaze in his face she said-- 'It has been on my mind this many a day to speak to you, Master Stanley; but whenever I meant to, summat came over me, and I couldn't.' 'Well, well, well,' said Lake, uneasily; 'I mean to call to-morrow, or next day, or some day soon, at Redman's Farm. I'll hear it then; this is no place, you know, Tamar, to talk in; besides I'm pressed for time, and can't stay now to listen.' 'There's no place like this, Master Stanley; it's so awful secret,' she said, with her hand still upon his arm. 'Secret! Why one place is as well as another; and what the devil have I to do with secrets? I tell you, Tamar, I'm in haste and can't stay. I _won't_ stay. There!' 'Master Stanley, for the love of Heaven--you know what I'm going to speak of; my old bones have carried me here--'tis years since I walked so far. I'd walk till I dropped to reach you--but I'd say what's on my mind, 'tis like a message from heaven--and I _must_ speak--aye, dear, I must.' 'But I say I can't stay. Who made you a prophet? You used not to be a fool, Tamar; when I tell you I can't, that's enough.' Tamar did not move her fingers from the sleeve of his coat, on which they rested, and that thin pressure mysteriously detained him. 'See, Master Stanley, if I don't say it to _you_, I must to another,' she said. 'You mean to threaten me, woman,' said he with a pale, malevolent look. 'I'm threatening nothing but the wrath of God, who hears us.' 'Unless you mean to do me an injury, Tamar, I don't know what else you mean,' he answered, in a changed tone.