The scene was inexpressibly cheerless. No other human creature was apparent, and the only sounds audible above the wind were those of the trickling streams which distributed the water over the meadow. A heron had been standing in one of these rivulets about twenty yards from the officer, and they vied with each other in stillness till the bird suddenly rose and flew off to the plantation in which it was his custom to pass the night with others of his tribe. De Stancy saw the heron rise, and seemed to imagine the creature’s departure without a supper to be owing to the increasing darkness; but in another minute he became conscious that the heron had been disturbed by sounds too distant to reach his own ears at the time. They were nearer now, and there came along under the hedge a young man known to De Stancy exceedingly well.
‘Ah,’ he said listlessly, ‘you have ventured back.’
‘Yes, captain. Why do you walk out here?’
‘The bells began ringing because she and he were expected, and my thoughts naturally dragged me this way. Thank Heaven the battery leaves Markton in a few days, and then the precious place will know me no more!’
‘I have heard of it.’ Turning to where the dim lines of the castle rose he continued: ‘Well, there it stands.’
‘And I am not in it.’
‘They are not in it yet either.’
‘They soon will be.’
‘Well—what tune is that you were humming, captain?’
‘ALL IS LOST NOW,’ replied the captain grimly.