ay be thought; but the storm and darkness were in my
favor, and I was fleet of foot, as were not all of my pursuers, as far
as I could foresee who these might be.

Momently I grew cooler, more determined, more calm, more desperate, more
regardless of consequences; and now the culmination of endeavor
approached in the shape of the sound of stamping feet upon the icy
platform of the steps which they had softly ascended, and the uncertain
fitting of a dead-latch key in its dark socket, the feeling for the knob
with half-frozen fingers, and finally the sudden and violent throwing
forward and open of the door into the darkened vestibule, for I had
drawn the cord at the first symptoms of Gregory's advent, which yet took
me by surprise. I had closed the inner doors, it is true, but paralyzed
with sudden terror I had taken no advantage of the darkness thus evoked,
and, as the tall form of the expected and expectant bridegroom staggered
in, literally blown forward by the tempest, with introverted umbrella,
and wet and streaming garments (dimly discerned in the gloom) that
brushed against me as he passed, I continued to stand transfixed to
stone in the niche I still occupied.

The dream in which La Vigne had prophesied my failure flashed over me
like lightning, and my knees trembled beneath me, yet I still clung
spasmodically to the cord I held, and with such desperate force that,
when Gregory pushed against the door, he believed it latched within, and
so desisted from further effort.

"Dark as Erebus," he muttered, "and on such a night! Confound such
hospitality! I suppose I must go back and ring;" and in pursuance of
this idea he again suddenly opened the front-door, which, swinging
violently back as he turned his face within, once more afforded me the
golden opportunity so lately lost. Quick as thought I dropped the cord I
held, and in the sudden gust the leaves of the inner door, thus
released, flew open and impelled my foe irresistibly forward. With his
flapping coat and hat he drifted into the lighted hall before the
driving blast, and, roused to instantaneous action, I slid from the
niche I filled to the icy platform without, and swift and silent as a
spectre sped down the sleety steps to the outward darkness. I was free!

A moment after, I heard the door slammed heavily after me, while I
crouched by the gate-post for concealment.

Rising up, I mutely blessed the friendly portal that made me an outcast
in the storm-sw