An' it be thou goest
forward--mum!--backward! Ha! have I caught thee, my pretty bird?"
At the conclusion of this speech, with the malice of a fiend urging on
his hesitating victim to the commission of some loathed act of folly and
of crime, the speaker lashed on his companion's beast, and they were
soon past the steepest part of the ascent, on their way to Raven Castle.
Its present occupier, whom, it appears, they had befriended beforetime,
in the way of their several callings, had sent for them in haste,
requiring their aid, it might seem, in some business relative to their
profession.
For an hour or two they travelled on as fast as the nature of their
track would permit. Day was just brightening in the east, when, emerging
from a more than usually intricate path, they pushed through a thick
archway of boughs. Suddenly a bare knoll presented itself, sloping
towards a narrow rivulet; beyond, a dark and well-fortified mansion
stood before them,--here and there, a turret-shaped chamber, lifting its
mural crown above the rest, rose clear and erect against a glowing sky,
now rapidly displacing the grey hues of the morning.
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