Helen’s heart died within her at the mere thought of threading alone a path so densely shaded, and of passing over that beetling rock, beneath the gnarled, fantastic looking tree. It would be so dark before she returned! She went to the window, and looked out, then turned towards him with such a timid, wistful look, it was astonishing how he could have resisted the mute appeal.
“Make haste, Helen,” said he, gently, “it will be dark if you do not.”
“Will you not go with me?” she at length summoned boldness to ask.
“Are you afraid to go, Helen?”
She felt the dark power of his eye to her inmost soul. Death itself seemed preferable to his displeasure.
“I am afraid,” she answered, “but I will go since you will it.”
“I do wish it,” he replied, “but I leave it to your own will to accomplish it.”
Helen could not believe that he really intended she should go alone, when he had left his sister behind. She was sure he would follow and overtake her before she reached the narrow path she so much dreaded to traverse. She went on very rapidly, looking back to see if he were not behind, listening to hear if her name were not called by his well-known voice. But she heard not his footsteps, nor the sound of his voice. She heard nothing but the wind sighing through the trees, or the notes of some solitary bird, seeking its nest among the branches.
“Arthur is not kind, to-day,” thought she. “I wonder what has changed him so. It was not my place to go after Alice, when he left her himself in the woods. What right has he to command me so? And how foolish I am to obey him, as if he were my master and lord!”
She was at first very angry with Arthur, and anger always gives one strength and power. Any excited passion does. She ran on, almost forgetting her fears, and the shadows lightened up as she met them face to face. Then she thought of Alice alone in the woods—so blind and helpless. Perhaps she would be frightened at the darkening solitude, and try to find her path homeward, on the edge of that slippery, beetling rock. With no hand to sustain, no eye to guide, how could she help falling into the watery chasm below? In her fears for Alice, she forgot her own imaginary danger, and flew on, sending her voice before her, bearing on its trembling tones the sweet name of Alice.