Love Among the Ruins by Warwick Deeping

The girl Yeoland saw nothing of the leper for a season. For several days she did not venture far into the pine forest, and the nameless grave heard not the sound of her lute. The third night after the incident, as she lay in her room under her canopy of purple cloth, she heard distinctly the silver clangour of a bell floating up through the midnight silence. She lay as still as a mouse, and scarcely drew breath, for fear the man in grey should venture up the stairway. The casement was open, with a soft June air blowing in like peace. The bell continued to tinkle, but less noisily, till it vanished into silence.

Other folk from the cliff had seen the leper, and Yeoland could not claim to have monopolised the gentleman. One of Fulviac's fellows had seen him one morning near the cliff, gliding like a grey ghost among the pines. Another had marked him creeping swiftly away through the twilight. It was a superstitious age and a superstitious region. The figure in grey seemed to haunt the place, with the occasional and mournful sounding of its bell. Men began to gossip, as the ignorant always will. Fulviac himself grew uneasy for more material reasons, and contemplated the test of a clothyard shaft or a bolt upon the leper's body. The man might be a spy, and if the bolt missed its mark it would at least serve as a sinister hint to this troublesome apparition.