“I have my duty to perform, dad; my duty is to remain with you,” she said decisively.  “You know you have quite a lot to do, and when your mother has gone we’ll spend an hour or two here at work.”

“I hear that Walter Murie is at home again at Connachan.  Hill told me this morning,” remarked her father.

“So I heard also,” answered the girl.

“And yet you are not going to the ball, Gabrielle, eh?” laughed the old man mischievously.

“Now come, dad,” the girl exclaimed, colouring slightly, “you’re really too bad!  I thought you had promised me not to mention him again.”

“So I did, dear; I—­I quite forgot,” replied Sir Henry apologetically.  “Forgive me.  You are now your own mistress.  If you prefer to stay away from Connachan, then do so by all means.  Only, make a proper excuse to your mother; otherwise she will be annoyed.”

“I think not, dear,” his daughter replied in a meaning tone.  “If I remain at home she’ll be rather glad than otherwise.”

“Why?” inquired the old man quickly.

The girl hesitated.  She saw instantly that her remark was an unfortunate one.  “Well,” she said rather lamely, “because my absence will relieve her of the responsibility of acting as chaperon.”

What else could she say?  How could she tell her father—­the kindly but afflicted man to whom she was devoted—­the bitter truth?  His lonely, dismal life was surely sufficiently hard to bear without the extra burden of suspicion, of enforced inactivity, of fierce hatred, and of bitter regret.  So she slowly disengaged her hand, kissed him again, and with an excuse that she had the menus to write for the dinner-table, went out, leaving him alone.

When the door had closed a great sigh sounded through the long, book-lined room, a sigh that ended in a sob.

The old man had leaned his chin upon his hands, and his sightless eyes were filled with tears.  “Is it the truth?” he murmured to himself.  “Is it really the truth?”

CHAPTER II

FROM OUT THE NIGHT

There are few of the Perthshire castles that more plainly declare their feudal origin and exhibit traces of obsolete power than does the great gaunt pile of ruins known as Glencardine.  Its situation is both picturesque and imposing, and the stern aspect of the two square baronial towers which face the south, perched on a sheer precipice that descends to the Ruthven Water deep below, shows that the castle was once the residence of a predatory chief in the days before its association with the great Montrose.

Two miles from the long, straggling village of Auchterarder, in the centre of a fine, well-wooded, well-kept estate, the great ruined castle stands a silent monument of warlike days long since forgotten.  There, within those walls, now overgrown with ivy and weeds, and where big trees grow in the centre of what was once the great paved courtyard, Montrose schemed and plotted, and, according to tradition, kept certain of his enemies in the dungeons below.