Whispers now heard sometimes at Glencardine are the secret deliberations of those sworn to kill the infamous Cardinal.  Mary, the daughter of the house, was allowed to decide in what manner her sister’s death should be avenged, and at her suggestion it was resolved that the inhuman head of the Roman Church should, before his life was taken, be put to the same fiendish tortures as those to which her sister had been subjected in his palace.”

“It is curious that after his crime the Cardinal should dare to visit Glencardine,” Gabrielle remarked.

“Not exactly.  His lordship, pretending that he wished to be appointed Governor of Scotland in the place of the Earl of Arran, had purposely made his peace with Setoun, who on his part was only too anxious to again resume friendly relations with so powerful a noble.  Therefore, early in May, 1546, he went on a private visit, and almost unattended, to Glencardine, within the walls of which fortress he disappeared for ever.  What exactly occurred will never be known.  All that the Commission who subsequently sat to try the conspirators were able to discover was that the Cardinal had been taken to the dungeon beneath the north tower, and there tortured horribly for several days, and afterwards burned at the stake in the courtyard, the fire being ignited by Lord Glencardine himself, and the dead Cardinal’s ashes afterwards scattered to the winds.”

“A terrible revenge!” exclaimed the girl with a shudder.  “They were veritable fiends in those days.”

“They were,” he laughed, rehanging the frame upon the wall.  “Some historians have, of course, declared that Setoun was murdered at Mains Castle, and others declare Cortachy to have been the scene of the assassination; but the truth that it occurred at Glencardine is proved by a quantity of the family papers which, when your father purchased Glencardine, came into his possession.  You ought to search through them.”

“I will.  I had no idea dad possessed any of the Glencardine papers,” she declared, much interested in that story of the past.  “Perhaps from them I may be able to glean something further regarding the strange Whispers of Glencardine.”

“Make whatever searches you like, dearest,” he said in all earnestness, “but never attempt to investigate the Whispers themselves.”  And as they were alone, he took her little hand in his, and looking into her face with eyes of love, pressed her to promise him never to disregard his warning.

She told him nothing of her own weird experience.  He was ignorant of the fact that she had actually heard the mysterious Whispers, and that, as a consequence, a great evil already lay upon her.

CHAPTER XV

FOLLOWS FLOCKART’S FORTUNES

One evening, a few days later, Gabrielle, seated beside her father at his big writing-table, had concluded reading some reports, and had received those brief, laconic replies which the blind man was in the habit of giving, when she suddenly asked, “I believe, dad, that you have a quantity of the Glencardine papers, haven’t you?  If I remember aright, when you bought the castle you made possession of these papers a stipulation.”