“Oh, Miss Olivia, we shall have them, we will make that woman speak out, and we shall save him yet.”
And the two girls, mistress and maid, cried together.
Alas! It did not occur to them that Seth the gypsy would, being as cunning as a gypsy, give them full credit for the telegraphing idea, and get out at some intermediate station.
CHAPTER XXXII.
THE TRIAL.
The days wore on. To Olivia they appeared sometimes to drag with leaden weight, at others to fly by on wings. No news had reached her of Bertie, no tidings of Bartley Bradstone, or Seth the gypsy, and Liz Lee. It seemed as if, indeed, Fate were fighting against her, and that the mystery which surrounded the murder in the woods grew deeper and darker as the hour of the trial drew near.
And it was very near now. For on the twenty-ninth, Harold Faradeane was to be tried, and it was now the night of the twenty-eighth.
Since she had sent the telegram to stop Seth, Olivia had not left the house; and though she had regained her strength, there was a look on her face, an expression of indefinable suspense and terror and sadness which almost drove the poor squire distracted.
But in his mind, as in others, the thoughts of all that the morrow night might mean to Harold Faradeane blotted out all else, even the remembrance of his darling’s situation: married to a man to whom she had not spoken since her wedding day, and who had gone off, left the country on “important business,” as he had written, with no intimation of his return.
But the finishing stroke to his anxiety was dealt him by Olivia herself, when, on the eve of the eventful day, she announced her intention of being present at the trial.
“You!” exclaimed the poor squire, aghast.