“I shall stay to defend my property,” said Henry Randolph, for it would never do, he thought, to miss that midnight train, and Dare’s house was three miles out of the city, “but if you will take my daughter with you, Mrs. Dare”—
“I shall stay with my father,” said Pinkie.
“You will not talk nonsense, but do as you are told,” said Mr. Randolph sharply. Pinkie’s red lips closed firmly, but she made no reply.
The carriages—there were three of them—rattled around to the door in a shorter time than they had ever been got ready since they left the builders’ hands; the last to start, Mr. Dare’s, was to have taken Pinkie, but that young lady was nowhere to be found, nor did she reply to any calling of her name.
“Oh! she must be in one of the other carriages,” cried Mrs. Dare, sobbing with terror; “Virgie, my dear, did you not see her drive off with your uncle in the phaeton?”
“I dare say she did; some one was with him; but don’t ask me, mamma, for I’m too frightened to see anything.”
There was no time to be lost, for the red glow of torches, the noise of singing, and the sound of that terrible tramp, were coming nearer with every second. The coachman slammed the door, and the carriage dashed away too swiftly to fear pursuit by men on foot.
Doors and windows had already been securely fastened, and now, that by which his guests had departed having been secured also, Mr. Randolph turned to re-enter the parlor.
“Now, all we have to do,” he said cheerfully to Louis and Edgar Harrison, who had stayed, hoping by his personal influence to do some good, “all we have to do is to—Pinkie!”
For down the great staircase, her eyes and cheeks bright with excitement, came Pinkie. She shivered with cold, and had wrapped a great scarlet opera cloak over the whiteness of her crape. One hand held the ermine collar closely around her throat, the other clung for support to the brazen balustrade; but her smile was as saucy as ever as she said,—