stion of the effort.

"Thank Heaven! we are safe," cried the apprentice; "but I fear the shock
has been too much for you."

"It has," gasped Amabel, falling against his shoulder. "Let us fly--oh!
let us fly."

Inexpressibly shocked and alarmed, Leonard twined his left arm round her
waist so as to hold her on the steed, for she was utterly unable to
support herself, and glancing anxiously at Nizza Macascree, struck off
on the right into the road skirting the Park, and in the direction of
Tyburn, where there was a small inn, at which he hoped to procure
assistance. Before reaching this place, he was beyond description
relieved to find that Amabel had so far recovered as to be able to raise
her head.

"The deadly faintness is passed," she murmured; "I shall be better soon.
But I fear I am too weak to pursue the journey at present."

Leonard spurred on his steed, and in another instant reached Tyburn, and
drew up at the little inn. But no assistance could be obtained there.
The house was closed; there was a red cross on the door; and a watchman,
stationed in front of it, informed him that all the family had died of
the plague except the landlord--"and he will be buried beside them in
Paddington churchyard before to-morrow morning," added the man; "for his
nurse tells me it is impossible he can survive many hours."

As he spoke an upper window was opened, and a woman, thrusting forth her
head, cried, "Poor Master Sandys has just breathed his last. Come in,
Philip, and help me to prepare the body for the dead-cart."

"I will be with you in a minute," rejoined the watchman. "You may
possibly procure accommodation at the Wheatsheaf at Paddington," he
added to Leonard; "it is but a short distance up the road."

Thanking him for the information, Leonard took the course indicated. He
had not proceeded far, when he was alarmed by hearing a piteous cry of
"Stop! stop!" proceeding from Blaize; and, halting, found that the
porter had been so greatly terrified by the watchman's account of the
frightful mortality in the poor innkeeper's family, that he had applied
to his phial of plague-water, and in pulling it put had dropped his box
of rufuses, and the jar of anti-pestilential confection. He had just
ascertained his loss, and wished to go back, but this Nizza Macascree
would not permit. Enraged at the delay, Leonard peremptorily ordered the
porter to come on; and Blaize, casting a rueful glance at his treasures,
which he perc