weeks pass by we may find a way to that hard and flinty heart."

"And whilst we wait it may well be that Cuthbert will be goaded to
desperation, or be done to death by his remorseless sire," answered
impetuous Kate, who loved not counsels of prudence. "Methinks that
waiting is an ill game. I would never wait were I a man. I would
always aet--ay, even in the teeth of deadly peril. Sure the
greatest deeds have been achieved by men of action, not by men of
counsel and prudence."

Sir Richard smiled, as he stroked her hair, and told her she should
have lived a hundred or so years back, when it was the fashion to
do and dare regardless of consequences. And gradually the talk
drifted away from the inmates of the old Gate House, though Philip
was quite resolved to pay an early visit there on the morrow, and
learn how it had fared with his cousin.

Supper followed in due course, and was a somewhat lengthy meal.
Then the ladies retired to the stately apartment they had been in
before, and the mother read a homily to her daughters, which was
listened to with dutiful attention. But Kate's bright eyes were
often bent upon the casement of one window, the curtain of which
she had drawn back with her own hand before sitting down; and as
the moon rose brighter and brighter in the sky and bathed the world
without in its clear white beams, she seemed to grow a little
restless, and tapped the floor with the point of her dainty shoe.

Kate Trevlyn was a veritable sprite for her love of the open air,
by night as well as day, in winter cold as well as summer heat.
"The night bird" was one of her father's playful names for her, and