Despondent, hopeless, grief-stricken, she sat before the fire for a long time.  She had locked the door and switched off the light, for it irritated her.  She loved the uncertain light of dancing flames, and sat huddled there in her big chair for the last time.

She was reflecting upon her own brief life.  Scarcely out of the schoolroom, she had lived most of her days up in that dear old place where every inch of the big estate was so familiar to her.  She remembered all those happy days at school, first in England, and then in France, with the kind-faced Sisters in their spotless head-dresses, and the quiet, happy life of the convent.  The calm, grave face of Sister Marguerite looked down upon her from the mantelshelf as if sympathising with her pretty pupil in those troubles that had so early come to her.  She raised her eyes, and saw the portrait.  Its sight aroused within her a new thought and fresh recollection.  Had not Sister Marguerite always taught her to beseech the Almighty’s aid when in doubt or when in trouble?  Those grave, solemn words of the Mother Superior rang in her ears, and she fell upon her knees beside her narrow bed in the alcove, and with murmuring lips prayed for divine support and assistance.  She raised her sweet, troubled face to heaven and made confession to her Maker.

Then, after a long silence, she struggled again to her feet, more cool and more collected.  She took up Walter’s portrait, and, kissing it, put it away carefully in a drawer.  Some of her little treasures she gathered together and placed with it, preparatory to departure, for she would on the morrow leave Glencardine perhaps for ever.

The stable-clock had struck ten.  To where she stood came the strident sounds of the mechanical piano-player, for some of the gay party were waltzing in the hall.  Their merry shouts and laughter were discordant to her ears.  What cared any of those friends of her step-mother if she were in disgrace and an outcast?

Drawing aside the curtain, she saw that the night was bright and starlit.  She preferred the air out in the park to the sounds of gaiety within that house which was no longer to be her home.  Therefore she slipped on a skirt and blouse, and, throwing her golf-cape across her shoulders and a shawl over her head, she crept past the room wherein Elise was packing her belongings, and down the back-stairs to the lawn.

The sound of the laughter of the men and women of the shooting-party aroused a poignant bitterness within her.  As she passed across the drive she saw a light in the library, where, no doubt, her father was sitting in his loneliness, feeling and examining his collection of seal-impressions.

She turned, and, walking straight on, struck the gravelled path which took her to the castle ruins.

Not until the black, ponderous walls rose before her did she awaken to a consciousness of her whereabouts.  Then, entering the ruined courtyard, she halted and listened.  All was dark.  Above, the stars twinkled brightly, and in the ivy the night-birds stirred the leaves.  Holding her breath, she strained her ears.  Yes, she was not deceived!  There were sounds distinct and undeniable.  She was fascinated, listening again to those shadow-voices that were always precursory of death—­the fatal Whispers.