She arose in silence from her knees, put her arms around his neck, kissed him, and glided from the room.
And now a terrible and mysterious thing happened to the bride-elect.
The lights had been turned very low in the hall. The household had all retired to rest. The stillness and the sense of darkness awed her as she glided noiselessly along in the deep shadows. Suddenly she saw the form of a man approaching from the direction of her own room. He might be some belated servant on some legitimate business for one of the guests, yet he startled her. She looked intently toward him, but in the obscure light she could only see that he was a tall man in dark clothing, and with a very white face. She shrank back in the shadow of the wall as he swiftly and silently approached her.
Then with amazement she recognized the face and form of her betrothed husband. But the face was deadly pale, and the form was shaking as with an ague fit.
"Arondelle! You here!" she exclaimed, starting towards him.
But she met only the empty air, the form had vanished.
In unbounded amazement she stared all around to see where it could have gone, and in what part of the darksome hall she herself then stood.
She found herself opposite to the entrance of a long, narrow passage opening from the hall and leading to the door of a staircase communicating with the dungeons of Malcolm's Tower.
She looked down that passage. It was black as the mouth of Hades!
A nameless terror seized her, and she fled precipitately down the hall, nor stopped until she had reached her own room, rushed in, and shut and bolted the door. Then she sank down into the nearest chair, feeling cold as ice, and trembling from head to foot.