"Fawside Tower—have you no ties there?"
"My mother—yes, my mother," said Florence, with a gush of tenderness in his heart, as he hastily dressed; "but once to embrace her, and then for Stirling—ho!"
"You may spare yourself the toil of such a journey; for I assure you, on the word of an honest man, that in less than three days perhaps those you seek will be again in Edinburgh."
To this the sole reply of Florence, was to kiss the opal ring, the secret of which he had as yet failed to discover.
"You must permit me to muffle your eyes."
"Wherefore, Master Posset? this precaution savours of mistrust, and becomes an insult."
"Laird of Fawside, I insist upon it; and she whose orders we must both obey also insists upon it."
"She—who?"
"The giver of the opal ring," whispered the doctor.
"Lead on—I obey," replied the young man, suddenly reduced to docility; "all things must end—and so this mystery."