The Highland monthly - National Library of Scotland

586 The Highland Monthly.
CHAPTER X.
GUILTY.
Just as the night was descending, and the stars began to
twinkle through rifts in the dark cloud masses, a trap
drove briskly away from the Castle, followed with a cheery
" God bless you, my boy," from the laird. The passenger
was Richard, off, as the laird and his household understood,
for a short holiday in the Scottish Capital. He looked
haggard, and behaved nervously ;
his appearance was such,
in fact, while admitting the seeming necessity for a change
of scene, the laird had some misgivings as to the wisdom of
Richard undertaking a night iourney on the mail coach.
" Richard, poor fellow, has not been himself for some
little time," he said to the old nurse and housekeeper as he
closed the door ;
" a touch of Edinburgh life will do him
good."
A short distance from the Castle, the highway took a
sudden turn westwards, bringing the gloomy old building
in full view of the traveller. As long as he could, Richard
kept his eyes rivetted upon his home. He little dreamt
that never again would he cross its threshold ; but a
foreboding of evil to come had seized upon him.
Immediately beneath the corner turret was Miss Flora's
room ; the light glimmered dimly. Everything had fitted
in marvellously with Richard's plans that day. It seemed
as if fate had decreed that whatsoever he had resolved to
do should be successfully accomplished. In the course of
the afternoon Flora had been seized with a violent head-
ache, a bane of female existence to which she was not an
unfrequent victim. Richard knew that his opportunity
had come, and suddenly announced that he would proceed
by coach that night. Flora was confined to her room all
evening, and there Richard had said his farewell. He had
intended to solicit the favour of her joining him in a glass