'There would be no chance at all, your honor, there's so many on 'em; I might as well try to run through that picket fence, crutches and all; and as to fightin' it out, your honor knows there's too much odds agin one—they'd blow him out of water.'
'Or sink him under it.'
'Or sink him under it, your honor.'
Peter's prophecy respecting the weather was too truly realized: the heavens, ere the night shut in, were covered with dark and ragged clouds, chasing each other like heaving surges wildly through the air: gusts of wind occasionally swept along, increasing in violence at each succeeding blast; while in the distance, the heavy roar of the ocean told plainly of the tumult that was going on there, and what might be expected when the strength of the tempest should break upon the land. The fitful gusts at length settled into one long-continued, furious blast, increasing gradually its terrible power, until the strongest dwellings rocked and trembled to their base, and even the stout-hearted turned their thoughts to Him whose will the winds obey, and before whose power man shrinks to nothing.
The family of Mr. Rutherford had been long in a state of painful anxiety, watching untiringly around the sick, and, to all human probability, the dying bed of Hettie. The scenes of trial which she had been passing through for several successive months, had imperceptibly weakened her frame; and the terrible ordeal of the mock-marriage proved just the stroke too much for her to bear. In the wildest delirium, her spirit tossed and agonized for weeks; and then, as her nature sunk, worn out with the wrestling of her troubled mind, it required the nicest care and most faithful attendance to stay up her feeble tenement.
Nothing was wanting that love could minister for her benefit; and hope again began to bless the spirits of friends. Her reason was restored, her strength gradually returned, and although confined still to her bed, the signs of recovery were so evident, that cheerfulness once more blessed the countenances of that much afflicted but still happy family.
Hettie had resolved to keep the secret with which she had been intrusted by her brother no longer than she could acquire strength to reveal it; and on this very day that we have been describing, she had told Mr. Rutherford all she knew.
That evening, while the tempest was roaring around his dwelling, he sat alone in the room where his family usually congregated, Mrs. Rutherford and the children having retired to Hettie's apartment, to give what cheer they could to the sick room during the wild howling of the storm. His thoughts, busied with the intelligence which had that day been communicated to him, and agitated between hope and fear, were devising all manner of plans for the recovery of documents of so much value, and the surest way to bring the dangerous men concerned in the transaction to justice, when a loud knocking against an outer door reached his ear. Thinking it might be some benighted stranger, he hurried to admit him, as soon as possible, to a shelter from the peltings of a pitiless storm.
Opening the door, he requested the stranger to hasten in, not waiting to inquire who he was, or what he wanted. The first glance, however, as he turned towards his visitor, made him regret that he had been so hasty; for David Cross, with a wild and haggard countenance, stood before him. Mr. Rutherford had no reason to think that his errand was a good one, but he was resolved to treat him with forbearance. David spoke first—
'A terrible storm, sir.'