It was in one of the last evenings of autumn, when after hearing this sorrowful narrative, and with it the knowledge that the only heart that ever truly loved her was cold in the grave, that Annora—in the craving for solitude and to be alone, left the old ivy-covered manse, and passing through the garden, issued into the glebe—a spacious park, surrounded by venerable trees—and seating herself upon a moss-grown stile, strove to think calmly, if possible, and pray.
Resplendent in gold and purple, the sky threw out in strong contour the summits of the Lomonds, from which the last rays of sunset had faded; and where she sat alone. The darkness had almost set in, the woods were so leafy and dense; yet in some places the twilight was liquid and clear. The trees were already yellowing fast, and the sear and russet leaves that had fallen before the strong gales that swept through the Howe, or great midland valley of Fife, were whirling about the place where she sat, as if to remind her that the year was dying.
Often in happier times had she wandered here with Willie, and the bark of more than one tree there bore their names and initials cut by his knife or dagger. The woodcock was seeking his nest in the hedges, and the snipe and the wild coot were among the reeds and rushes of the loch and burn; and Annora, as she gazed around her, thought sadly that it was the autumn of a year of married misery, and the winter of her aching heart.
Suddenly some mysterious impulse—for there was no sound but the sense of something being nigh, made her look round, and then a start, a shudder, convulsed her, rooting her to the spot; for there by the stile whereon she sat was Willie Calderwood, looking just as she had seen him last, in his cavalier dress, with plumed beaver and white cockade, long rapier and short velvet mantle: but his features, when viewed by the calm, clear twilight, seemed paler, his eyes sadder, and the sword wound on his cheek more livid and dark.
He was not dead—he lived yet, and her brother Philip had deceived her!
She made a start forward, and then drew back, withheld by an impulse of terror, and holding up her poor thin hands deprecatingly, faltered out—
"Oh! come not nigh me, Willie. I am a wedded wife."
"And false to me, Annora. Is it not so?" he asked, with a voice that thrilled through her.
She wept, and laid her hands upon her crushed heart, while Willie's sad eyes, that had a glare in them, caused doubtless by his wound, seemed to pierce her soul; they seemed so bright, so earnest, and beseeching in the autumn twilight.
"They told you I was false to you, or slain in France, and you believed them?"