The vehicle was proceeding along a road skirted only by a few leafless trees, and wearing an aspect strange and new to her.
The country beyond, on either side, seemed to present to her view different outlines from those which frequent passage along the road leading to Markham Place had rendered familiar to her eyes. Again she gazed wistfully forth:—she lowered the window, and surveyed the adjacent scenery with redoubled interest.
And now she felt really alarmed; for she was convinced that the driver had mistaken the road.
She called to him, and expressed her fears.
"No—no, ma'am," he exclaimed, without relaxing the speed at which the vehicle was proceeding; "there's more ways than one of reaching the place where you live. Don't be afraid, ma'am—it's all right."
Ellen's fears were hushed for a short time; but as she leant partially out of the window to survey the country through which she was passing, the sounds of another vehicle behind her own fell upon her ears.
At any other time this circumstance would not have produced a second thought; but on this occasion Ellen felt a presentiment of evil. Whether the mournful catastrophe of the evening, or her recent sad reflections,—or both united, had produced this morbid feeling, we cannot say. Sufficient is it for us to know that such was the state of her mind; and then she remembered the warning contained in the letter so mysteriously sent to her a short time previously at the theatre.
Again she addressed the cabman; but this time he made no answer; and in a few minutes he drove up to the door of a small house which stood alone by the side of that dreary road.
Scarcely had he alighted from his box, when the second cab came up and stopped also.
"Where am I?" demanded Ellen, now seriously alarmed.