d of prickers, through which we both
struggled till we came into a sort of swamp. Here was bad going, but we
floundered on, edging continually toward a distant fence beyond which
rose the symmetrical lines of an orchard--Mr. Trohm's orchard, in which
those pleasant fruits grew which--Bah! should I ever be able to get the
taste of them out of my mouth!

At a tiny gateway covered with vines, Loreen stopped.

"I do not believe this has been opened for years, but it must be opened
now." And, throwing her whole weight against it, she burst it through,
and bidding me pass, hastened after me over the trailing branches and
made, without a word, for the winding path we now saw clearly defined on
the edge of the orchard before us.

"Oh!" exclaimed Loreen, stopping one moment to catch her breath, "I do
not know what I fear or to what our steps will bring us. I only know
that I must hunt for Lucetta till I find her. If there is danger where
she is, I must share it. You can rest here or come farther on."

I went farther on.

Suddenly we both started; a man had sprung up from behind the hedgerow
that ran parallel with the fence that surrounded Mr. Trohm's place.

"Silence!" he whispered, putting his finger on his lips. "If you are
looking for Miss Knollys," he added, seeing us both pause aghast, "she
is on the lawn beyond, talking to Mr. Trohm. If you will step here, you
can see her. She is in no kind of danger, but if she were, Mr. Gryce is
in the first row of trees to the back there, and a call from me----"

That made me remember my whistle. It was still round my neck, but my
hand, which had instinctively gone to it, fell again in extraordinary
emotion as I realized the situation and compared it with that of the
morning when, blinded by egotism and foolish prejudice in favor of this
man, I ate of his fruit and hearkened to his outrageous addresses.

"Come!" beckoned Loreen, happily too absorbed in her own emotions to
notice mine. "Let us get nearer. If Mr. Trohm is the wicked man we fear,
there is no telling what the means are which he uses to get rid of his
victims. There was nothing to be found in his house, but who knows where
the danger may lurk, and that it may not be near her now? It was
evidently to dare it she came, to offer herself as a martyr, that we
might know----"

"Hush!" I whispered, controlling my own fears roused against my will by
this display of terror in this usually calmest of natures. "No danger
can