Green Fancy | Page 3

out to her above the gale:
"Can I be of any assistance to you?"
She turned quickly. He saw that the veil was drawn tightly over her face.
"No, thank you," she replied. Her voice, despite a certain nervous note, was soft and clear and gentle,--the voice and speech of a well- bred person who was young and resolute.
"Pardon me, but have you much farther to go? The storm will soon be upon us, and--surely you will not consider me presumptuous--I don't like the idea of your being caught out in--"
"What is to be done about it?" she inquired, resignedly. "I must go on. I can't wait here, you know, to be washed back to the place I started from."
He smiled. She had wit as well as determination. There was the suggestion of mirth in her voice--and certainly it was a most pleasing, agreeable voice.
"If I can be of the least assistance to you, pray don't hesitate to command me. I am a sort of tramp, you might say, and I travel as well by night as I do by day,--so don't feel that you are putting me to any inconvenience. Are you by any chance bound for Hart's Tavern? If so, I will be glad to lag behind and carry your bag."
"You are very good, but I am not bound for Hart's Tavern, wherever that may be. Thank you, just the same. You appear to be an uncommonly genteel tramp, and it isn't because I am afraid you might make off with my belongings." She added the last by way of apology.
He smiled--and then frowned as he cast an uneasy look at the black clouds now rolling ominously up over the mountain ridge.
"By Jove, we're going to catch it good and hard," he exclaimed. "Better take my advice. These storms are terrible. I know, for I've encountered half a dozen of them in the past week. They fairly tear one to pieces."
"Are you trying to frighten me?"
"Yes," he confessed. "Better to frighten you in advance than to let it come later on when you haven't any one to turn to in your terror. You are a stranger in these parts?"
"Yes. The railway station is a few miles below here. I have walked all the way. There was no one to meet me. You are a stranger also, so it is useless to inquire if you know whether this road leads to Green Fancy."
"Green Fancy? Sounds attractive. I'm sorry I can't enlighten you." He drew a small electric torch from his pocket and directed its slender ray upon the sign-post. So fierce was the gale by this time that he was compelled to brace his strong body against the wind.
"It is on the road to Frogg's Corner," she explained nervously. "A mile and a half, so I am told. It isn't on the sign-post. It is a house, not a village. Thank you for your kindness. And I am not at all frightened," she added, raising her voice slightly.
"But you ARE" he cried. "You're scared half out of your wits. You can't fool me. I'd be scared myself at the thought of venturing into those woods up yonder."
"Well, then, I AM frightened," she confessed plaintively. "Almost out of my boots."
"That settles it," he said flatly. "You shall not undertake it."
"Oh, but I must. I am expected. It is import--"
"If you are expected, why didn't some one meet you at the station? Seems to me--"
"Hark! Do you hear--doesn't that sound like an automobile--Ah!" The hoarse honk of an automobile horn rose above the howling wind, and an instant later two faint lights came rushing toward them around a bend in the mountain road. "Better late than never," she cried, her voice vibrant once more.
He grasped her arm and jerked her out of the path of the on-coming machine, whose driver was sending it along at a mad rate, regardless of ruts and stones and curves. The car careened as it swung into the pike, skidded alarmingly, and then the brakes were jammed down. Attended by a vast grinding of gears and wheels, the rattling old car came to a stop fifty feet or more beyond them.
"I'd sooner walk than take my chances in an antediluvian rattle-trap like that," said the tall wayfarer, bending quite close to her ear. "It will fall to pieces before you--"
But she was running down the road towards the car, calling out sharply to the driver. He stooped over and took up the travelling bag she had dropped in her haste and excitement. It was heavy, amazingly heavy.
"I shouldn't like to carry that a mile and a half," he said to himself.
The voice of the belated driver came to his ears on the swift wind. It was high pitched and unmistakably apologetic. He could not hear what she was saying