The library was also found untenanted. No visitor was there.
The cavalier was beginning to feel surprised; when a light glimmering in the kitchen, and a sound heard from it, led him to proceed in that direction.
On entering this homely apartment, he beheld the individual, who had done him the honour to await his coming home at such a late hour of the night. A glance inside betrayed the presence of Gregory Garth.
The ex-footpad was stretched along a large beechwood bench, in front of the fire; which, though originally a good one, was now in a somewhat smouldering condition—the half-burnt fagots having parted in twain, and tumbled down on each side of the andirons.
There was no lamp; but from the red embers, and the blaze that intermittently twinkled, there came light enough to enable the cavalier to identify the form and features of his visitor.
Their owner was as sound asleep, as if in his own house, and reclining under the coverlet of his own couch; whilst a stentorian snore, proceeding from his spread nostrils, proclaimed a slumber from which it would require a good shaking to arouse him.
“So Gregory Garth!” muttered the cavalier, bending over the sleeper, and gazing with a half-quizzical expression, into the countenance of his quondam retainer. “It’s you, my worthy sir, I have the honour of entertaining?”
A prolonged snore—such as might proceed from the nostrils of a rhinoceros—was the only response.
“I wonder what’s brought him here to-night, so soon after—. Shall I awake him, and ask; or leave him to snore away till the morning?”
Another trumpet-like snort seemed intended to signify the assent of the sleeper to the latter course of proceeding.