"No, you have done no wrong, Minna; but tell me the rest."
She waited a second, and then continued:
"In the carriage, to-night, the truth came out. Aunt Gratz and he quarrelled, and with a sort of blunt, brutal frankness he blurted out the truth that we were flying from, not to, you, and that he was carrying me away to make me his wife. In his mad rage against you he heaped all kinds of abuse on you, knowing that it made my blood boil. He is a villain."
"He has paid for his treachery by now, probably," I said, and then there came a longer pause.
"Don't you wish to hear any more?" she asked gently, as if anxious to make me speak to her; and when I told her that I was only too eager to hear it all, she went on: "I thought it best to say nothing, but I made up my mind that I would slip away and seek any one's help rather than stay with them. My great thought was to get back to the house at Landsberg; and I sat as if prostrated with grief and waited, watching for a chance. It came at last, at a town where we stopped to change horses, and he got out of the carriage. There was some delay; and I saw him enter the house. Aunt Gratz was half dead with fatigue, and lay back in the carriage and fell asleep. I opened the door on my side very softly and slipped out, without disturbing her, and then ran off in the thick dusk for my life. I was soon missed, of course, and should not have escaped had it not been that there was a wagon standing not far away, though out of sight of those in the carriage. There was no one in it, and I jumped in and hid myself among some hay and sacks that lay in the bottom. I lay concealed there a long time and heard the hue and cry raised, and people searching for me, though no one thought to look in the wagon. Presently the wagoner came, and we started off at a slow pace. I let him go on for a few miles, and then to his intense astonishment I rose up suddenly from among the sacks and told him I would give him money if he would take me toward Landsberg."
"Poor Minna! What an experience for you."
"I did not care then, for I was free from that man. The wagoner was a good fellow and, though I did not know it, we had been coming in this direction, and he set me down about a mile from here, where his road turned off. I walked on to be frightened again, but this time—by you; and then to feel safe, oh, so safe, again."
"You did splendidly!" I cried warmly; for her pluck and resource had been admirable. And then I walked on in silence thinking how best I could commence my confession.
"Can you hear sounds of any one coming?" she asked.
I stopped the horse directly and stood listening. Turning my head, I glanced in her face and saw a smile there.