THE SMUGGLER. 315 



hour more, without any feasible plan of action having been 

 decided upon, and with no further result than the arrangement 

 of means for frequent and private communication. It was 

 settled, indeed, that Lay ton should fix his head- quarters at 

 Woodchurch, and that two or three of the dragoons should 

 be biletted at a small public -house on the roacl to Harbournc. 

 To them any communication from Sir Edward Digby was to 

 be conveyed by his servant, Somers, for the purpose of being 

 forwarded to Woodchurch. Such matters being thus arranged, 

 as far as circumstances admitted, the two friends parted ; and 

 Digby rode back to Harbourne House, which he reached, as 

 may be supposed, somewhat later than Sir Robert CroylancPs 

 dinner-hour. 



CHAPTER XXVIII. 



ABOUT six o'clock on the evening of the same day, the 

 cottage of Mrs. Clare was empty. The good widow herself 

 stood at the garden gate, and looked up the road into the 

 wood, along which the western sun was streaming low. After 

 gazing for a moment in that direction, she turned her eyes to 

 .the left, and then down the edge of the wood, which stretched 

 along in a tolerably even line till it reached the farther angle. 

 The persevering dragoons were patrolling round it still; and 

 Mrs. Clare murmured to herself, " How will he ever get out, 

 if they keep such a watch?" 



She was then going into the cottage again, when a hurried 

 step caught her ear, coming apparently from the path which 

 led from the side of Halden to the back of the house, and 

 thence round the little garden into the road. 



" That sounds like Hardirig's step," thought the widow; and 

 her ear had not deceived her. In another minute she beheld 

 him turn the corner of the fence and come towards her; but 

 there was a heated and angry look upon his face, which she 

 had never seen there before; and, although she had acted for 

 the best, and not without much consideration, in sending Kate 

 upon Mr. Radford's commission, arid not going herself, she 

 feared that her daughter's lover might not be well pleased 

 his bride should undertake such a task. As he came near, 



