“What should ail us to see them?” said the one old woman.

“I counted them,” said the other, with the eagerness of a person to whom the spectacle had afforded too much interest to be viewed with indifference.

“But ye did not see,” said Ailsie, exulting in her superior observation, “that there’s a thirteenth amang them that they ken naething about; and, if auld freits say true, there’s ane o’ that company that’ll no be lang for this warld.  But come awa’ cummers; if we bide here, I’se warrant we get the wyte o’ whatever ill comes of it, and that gude will come of it nane o’ them need ever think to see.”

And thus, croaking like the ravens when they anticipate pestilence, the ill-boding sibyls withdrew from the churchyard.

In fact, the mourners, when the service of interment was ended, discovered that there was among them one more than the invited number, and the remark was communicated in whispers to each other.  The suspicion fell upon a figure which, muffled in the same deep mourning with the others, was reclined, almost in a state of insensibility, against one of the pillars of the sepulchral vault.  The relatives of the Ashton family were expressing in whispers their surprise and displeasure at the intrusion, when they were interrupted by Colonel Ashton, who, in his father’s absence, acted as principal mourner.  “I know,” he said in a whisper, “who this person is, he has, or shall soon have, as deep cause of mourning as ourselves; leave me to deal with him, and do not disturb the ceremony by unnecessary exposure.”  So saying, he separated himself from the group of his relations, and taking the unknown mourner by the cloak, he said to him, in a tone of suppressed emotion, “Follow me.”

The stranger, as if starting from a trance at the sound of his voice, mechanically obeyed, and they ascended the broken ruinous stair which led from the sepulchre into the churchyard.  The other mourners followed, but remained grouped together at the door of the vault, watching with anxiety the motions of Colonel Ashton and the stranger, who now appeared to be in close conference beneath the shade of a yew-tree, in the most remote part of the burial-ground.

To this sequestered spot Colonel Ashton had guided the stranger, and then turning round, addressed him in a stern and composed tone.—­“I cannot doubt that I speak to the Master of Ravenswood?” No answer was returned.  “I cannot doubt,” resumed the Colonel, trembling with rising passion, “that I speak to the murderer of my sister!”

“You have named me but too truly,” said Ravenswood, in a hollow and tremulous voice.

“If you repent what you have done,” said the Colonel, “may your penitence avail you before God; with me it shall serve you nothing.  Here,” he said, giving a paper, “is the measure of my sword, and a memorandum of the time and place of meeting.  Sunrise to-morrow morning, on the links to the east of Wolf’s Hope.”