The heavy hammer slowly rang out ten strokes through the gloomy night-time and the dying storm.
I waited till the last humming echo of the clock fainted into dead stillness.

I listened once more attentively, and again listened in vain.
Then I rose, and proposed to my brothers that we should leave our guest to compose herself for the night.
When Owen and Morgan were ready to quit the room, I took her by the hand, and drew her a little aside.
"You leave us early, my dear," I said; "but, before you go to-morrow morning--" I stopped to listen for the last time, before the words were spoken which committed me to the desperate experiment of pleading George's cause in defiance of his own request.

Nothing caught my ear but the sweep of the weary weakened wind and the melancholy surging of the shaken trees.
"But, before you go to-morrow morning," I resumed, "I want to speak to you in private.

We shall breakfast at eight o'clock.

Is it asking too much to beg you to come and see me alone in my study at half past seven ?" Just as her lips opened to answer me I saw a change pass over her face.