a
table, she showed me lying on its top a folded paper and two letters.
The folded paper was Lucetta's Will, and the letters were directed
severally to Loreen and to myself with the injunction that they were not
to be read till she had been gone six hours.

"She has prepared herself for death!" I exclaimed, shocked to my heart's
core, but determinedly hiding it. "But you need not fear any such event.
Is she not accompanied by Mr. Gryce?"

"I do not know; I do not think so. How could she accomplish her task if
not alone? Miss Butterworth, Miss Butterworth, she has gone to brave Mr.
Trohm, our mother's persecutor and our life-long enemy, thinking,
hoping, believing that in so doing she will rouse his criminal
instincts, if he has them, and so lead to the discovery of his crimes
and the means by which he has been enabled to carry them out so long
undetected. It is noble, it is heroic, it is martyr-like, but--oh! Miss
Butterworth, I have never broken a promise to any one before in all my
life, but I am going to break the one I made her. Come, let us fly after
her! She has her lover's memory, but I have nothing in all the world but
her."

I immediately turned and hastened down the stairs in a state of
humiliation which should have made ample amends for any show of
arrogance I may have indulged in in my more fortunate moments.

Loreen followed me, and when we were in the lower hall she gave me a
look and said:

"My promise was not to enter the highway. Would you be afraid to follow
me by another road--a secret road--all overgrown with thistles and
blackberry bushes which have not been trimmed up for years?"

I thought of my thin shoes, my neat silk dress, but only to forget them
the next moment.

"I will go anywhere," said I.

But Loreen was already too far in advance of me to answer. She was young
and lithe, and had reached the kitchen before I had passed the Flower
Parlor. But when we had sped clear of the house I found that my progress
bade fair to be as rapid as hers, for her agitation was a hindrance to
her, while excitement always brings out my powers and heightens both my
wits and my judgment.

Our way lay past the stables, from which I expected every minute to see
two or three dogs jump. But William, who had been discreetly sent out of
the way early in the afternoon, had taken Saracen with him, and possibly
the rest, so our passing by disturbed nothing, not even ourselves. The
next moment we were in a fiel