pledge, no compact, I will do my utmost to save
this youth; I will spare no exertion or influence I possess with the
Government; I will make his pardon the recompense due to myself, but if
that be impossible, I will endeavour to obtain connivance at his
escape, and all the price I ask for this is, your forgiveness of my
presumption."

Kate held out her hand towards him, while a smile of bewitching
loveliness played over her features; "this is to be a friend indeed,"
said she.

Hemsworth bent down his head till his lips rested on her fingers, and
as he did so, the hot tears trickled on her hand, then suddenly starting
up, he said, "I must lose no time; where shall I find your cousin?--in
what part of the country has he sought shelter?"

"The shealing at the foot of Hungry mountain, he mentioned to Herbert as
the rendezvous for the present."

"Is he alone--has he no companion?"

"None, save, perhaps, the idiot boy who acts as his guide in the
mountains."

"Farewell then," said Hemsworth, "you shall soon hear what success
attends my efforts; farewell"--and, without waiting for more, he
hastened from the spot, and was soon heard descending the causeway at a
rapid pace.

Kate stood for a few moments lost in thought, and as the sound of the
retreating hoofs aroused her, she looked up, and muttering to herself,
"It was nobly done," returned with slow steps to the house.

As Hemsworth spurred his horse, and urged him to his fastest speed,
expressions of mingled triumph and vengeance burst from him at
intervals--"Mine at last," cried he--"mine in spite of every
obstacle,---Fortune is seldom so kind as this--vengeance and ambition
both gratified together--me, whom they dispised for my poverty, and
my low birth--that it should be my destiny to crush them to the dust!"
These words were scarcely uttered, when his horse, pressed beyond his
strength, stumbled over a rut in the road, and fell heavily to the
ground, throwing his rider under him.

For a long time no semblance of consciousness returned, and the groom,
fearing to leave him, had to wait for hours until a country car should
pass, in which his wounded master might be laid. There came one by at
last, and on this Hemsworth was laid, and brought back to "the Lodge."
Before he reached home, however, sense had so far returned, as, that he
felt his accident was attended with no serious injury; the shock of the
fall was the only circumstance of any gravity.

The medica