Mischievous Maid Faynie | Page 8

other in a sharp, dry, hard voice. "If this
girl whom I marry to-night were to die suddenly on the wedding trip,
for instance, I would come in for her fortune; then, when the
excitement blew over, I could go to Gertrude and say--"

The sentence was never finished, for at that moment the door of the
vehicle was suddenly wrenched open, and with a piercing cry Faynie
sprang out into the raging storm and the inky blackness of the night.
A terrible imprecation broke from the lips of the handsome scoundrel
by her side.
"I'll bet a dollar to a doughnut that that little fool tricked us by feigning
unconsciousness, and has heard every word we uttered. Of course, it's
to be regretted, but that doesn't change my plans a particle. I'll be the
husband of the willful little heiress in an hour's time, or my name
isn't--"
"Lester Armstrong," put in the other, laconically.
The coach was instantly stopped, and both men made a flying leap into
the huge snowdrift that banked both sides of the country road, calling
back to the driver to light a lantern, if he had been careful enough to
bring one with him, and hand it to them in double-quick order.
The search lasted for fully half an hour. Had the ground suddenly
opened and swallowed her? they asked each other, with imprecations
both loud and furious.
To have a fortune of a cool million so near his clutches, and suddenly
lose it, was more than the villain could endure calmly. He was frenzied.
His rage at the girl slipping so cleverly, so audaciously, through his
fingers knew no bounds, and he made no attempt to stifle the fierce
exclamations that sprang to his lips of what he should do when he once
found her.
When Faynie had jumped from the vehicle she lay for an instant half
stunned upon the cold, frozen ground where she had fallen. It had taken
the coach a minute to stop, but that minute had carried it several rods
beyond the spot where she lay. She saw by the uncertain glimmer of the
carriage lamp the two forms spring out into the darkness and come
back in search of her, and a piteous cry of unutterable fear rose to her
blanched lips from the very depths of her panting, terror-stricken heart.

She tried to spring to her feet and fly, but the depth to which she sank
with every step exhausted her quickly, and she sank down among the
white drifts awaiting her doom like a wounded bird in the brush whom
the cruel sportsmen are nearing with their hounds.
She raised her lovely young face to the dark night sky, calling upon
God and the angels to protect her, to save her from the man she had
loved with all the passionate strength of her heart up to that hour, and
whom she hated and feared now a thousandfold more than she had ever
loved him.
All in a few moments of time her idol had fallen from its high pedestal
of manly honor and lay in ruins at her feet.
How could she ever have believed Lester Armstrong noble, good and
true, a king among men? Where was the tenderness in voice and
manner that had won her heart from her, and his oft-repeated assurance
that he cared for her for herself alone; that he wished to Heaven she
were no heiress, but as poor as himself, that he might show her the
power of his great love? An hour ago--only an hour ago--yet it seemed
the length of a lifetime in the shadowy past, she had crept out of the
house to meet her lover at the trysting place, her heart beating with love
for him, sobbing out to Heaven to send her true love quickly back to
her.
As she had closed the door of the great mansion noiselessly behind her,
she realized that she was putting wealth and luxury away from her
deliberately and choosing a life of rigid economy with the lover whose
earnings were, alas, so much smaller than even the pin money she had
been accustomed to.
But with love to brighten the way, she felt that she could endure any
hardship with noble Lester Armstrong, who loved her so dearly and
devotedly.
After a time, perhaps, her father would forgive her for this step, and
take her back to his home and heart, and welcome Lester, too. She had
read of such things.

The night air blew bitterly cold against her face as she stepped bravely
forth, but she did not waver.
The great hall clock chimed the hour of ten, and her heart beat faster,
for she said to herself that her lover was nearing the trysting place and
she