Virginia breathed hard, compressed her lips, white with indignation as well as with suffering, and let him act his part. And the confident lover did not dream that those eyes, red with grief and surrounded by dark circles, saw through all his hypocritical professions, or that the cold, passive little hand, abandoned through the apathy of despair to his caresses, would have been thrust into the fire, before ever he would have been allowed to win it.
"Surely," she managed to say in a voice scarce above a whisper, "if ever we needed a true, disinterested friend, it is now. Sit down; and be so kind as to excuse me a moment. I will call my sister."
So she withdrew. And Augustus smiled. "Now is my time!" he said complacently to himself, resolved to make an offer of that valuable hand of his that very night: forlorn, friendless, wretched, was it possible that she could refuse such a prize? So he sat, and fondled his curls, and practised sweet smiles, and sympathized with Salina when she came, and waited for Virginia,—little knowing what was to happen to her, and to him, and to all, before ever he saw that vanished face again.
For Virginia had business on her hands that night. She remembered the hurried directions Penn had given for communicating with her father, and she was already preparing to send off Toby to the round rock.
"Gracious, missis!" said the old negro, returning hastily to the kitchen door where she stood watching his departure, "dar's a man out dar, a waitin'! Did ye see him, missis?"
She had indeed seen a human figure advance in the darkness, as if with intent to intercept or follow him. Perplexed and indignant at the discovery, she suffered the old servant to return into the house, and remained herself to see what became of the figure. It moved off a little way in the darkness, and disappeared.
"Wha' sh'll we do?" Toby rolled up his eyes in consternation. "Do jes' speak to Mr. Bythewood, Miss Jinny; he's de bestist friend—he'll tell what to do."
"No, no, Toby!" said Virginia, collecting herself, and speaking with decision. "He is the last person I would consult. Toby, you must try again; for either you or I must be at the rock before ten o'clock."
"You, Miss Jinny? Who eber heern o' sich a ting!"
"Go yourself, then, good Toby!" And she earnestly reminded him of the necessity.