She went into her bedroom and looked about for a hiding-place.

At length she found one which she thought would be secure.

The gilt cornice at the top of her bedroom window was hollow.  She climbed up on top of her dressing bureau, and reaching as far as she could she pushed first the snuff-box, (which also contained the diamond ring,) and then the watch and chain, far into the hollow part of the cornice, over the window.

There she thought they would be perfectly safe.

The next few days passed without anything occurring to disturb the peace of this misguided peasant girl.

Every morning the man who called himself Lord Arondelle, but who was known at the house he occupied only as Mr. Scott, and who professed to be the husband of the young woman—­went out in the morning and remained absent until evening.

Every day the girl, known to her servants as Mrs. Scott, spent in dressing, going out riding in a cab, and freely spending the money that her husband lavished upon her, and in gormandizing in a manner that must have destroyed the digestive organs of any animal less sound and strong than this “handsome hizzie” from the Highlands.

On the Monday of the week following the tragedy at Castle Lone, however, Mr. Scott came home in the evening in a state of agitation and alarm.

“Where is that satchel with the money?” he inquired as he entered the bedroom of his wife.

She stared at him in astonishment, but his looks so frightened her that she hastened to produce the bag.

He took from it a little bag of gold marked L500, and threw it in her lap, saying: 

“There, take that!” And before she could utter a word, he hurried out of the room.

She ran down stairs after him, calling: 

“John!  John! what ails you?  What hae fashed ye sae muckle?”

But he banged the hall door and was gone.

“That’s unco queer!” said Rose, as she retraced her steps, up stairs, feeling a vague anxiety creeping upon her.

“He’ll be back sune.  He has na gane a journey, for he has na ta’en e’en sa mickle as a change o’ linnen, or a second collar,” she said, as she regained her room, and sank down breathless into a chair.

The bag of gold he had left her next attracted her attention.  L500—­ten times as much as she had ever possessed in her life.  The contemplation of this fortune drove all speculations about the movements of “John” out of her head.  “John” was always queer and uncertain, and would go off suddenly sometimes and be gone for days.

“I winna fash mysel’ anent him!  He may tak’ his ain gait, and I’ll tak’ mine!” she said to herself, as she resolved to go out the very next day and buy what her heart had long been set upon—­a cashmere shawl!

The next morning’s papers however contained news from Lone, which, had Rose taken the trouble to look at them, must have thrown some light upon the sudden departure of Mr. Scott.