In a moment Marston was by her side.
‘Ruth! dear Ruth!’ he exclaimed, ‘for Heaven’s sake what does this mean? Dare I hope that——’
Ruth drew away the hand he had seized.
‘Mr. Marston,’ she exclaimed passionately, ‘it means that I was wrong to come here. I came to warn you of a deadly peril; hear me, and let me go.’
‘Ruth, if you have come to tell me of the deadliest peril I shall ever be in on this side of the grave, I will welcome it since it has brought us face to face once more.’
Was he acting, this man, or were the impassioned accents in which he spoke the honest reflex of his feelings?
‘Hush!’ exclaimed Ruth; ‘you must not speak to me like that. We are strangers.’
‘We have been; but need we be any longer? I am not the man I was, Ruth. Ten years ago I left England, an adventurer, a schemer, a villain, if you will. I return to it to-day with a fortune acquired by honest industry, with a home which I can offer without a blush to the woman I would make my wife, with a heart cleansed from the old corruption. Oh, Ruth, with God’s help and yours I could do so much!’
Ruth stopped him ere he could say another word.
‘Listen to what I have to say, and let me go,’ she said, her voice trembling and her face deadly pale. ‘I have come here to tell you that there is a plot against you. A man named Heckett——’