“Can we have a coupé?” inquired Malcolm, slipping a crown into the hands of one of the guards.
“Oh, yes, sir,” answered that functionary, opening a door and admitting the fugitives into the desired privacy.
“Sweethearts!” he muttered to himself, as he locked the door and pocketed the crown.
The train started, and Malcolm and Eudora, finding themselves alone in the coupé, looked in each other’s faces wistfully.
“Oh, Malcolm,” said Eudora, “how terrible it is to be so wronged and hated, and by one’s old family friends, too! Did you hear old Admiral Brunton, how he spoke of me? Ah! little did he think how near at hand I was to hear him.”
“Yes, dear Eudora, I heard him. His remarks were valuable, only to show how right you are to fly until this storm shall pass,” replied the young man.
“But to be wronged and hated so, Malcolm, and by my uncle’s old friends! Oh! it is very, very cruel!”
“You must bear up under it bravely, dear love. The time will come when your innocence will be proved, and then those very friends who wrong you by their suspicions now will bitterly repent their injustice, and will love and esteem you more than ever before,” answered the young man, encouragingly.
The train rattled on. It was the express, and stopped at no other station between Abbeytown and London, where it was expected to arrive at five o’clock in the morning.
Malcolm and Eudora sank back in their seats, and fell into silence.