But what to do? How, bound mouth, hands and feet as she was, to make her feeling known to Fult, to turn him from his wild purpose, and persuade him to take her back before the night was yet over, and the news of their going had become known? He would never give over his purpose if she was unable to speak until they reached the next county-seat and the clerk's office in the morning, and the escapade had become public property. His pride would not permit that. Whatever was to be done must be done at once, for they were traveling at a swift pace, and the time must be past midnight.
Desperately she cast about in her mind for a plan; still more desperately she realized that she had none—was all at sea. She was not used to getting herself out of her difficulties—it was Thomas Vance who always did that. She had always, since babyhood, taken her troubles to him; and always he knew a way out for her. She felt confident that, if he were only at hand, he could help her out of this. She even had a feeling that, if she could call to him, he would hear her, two hundred miles away, and save her.
Suddenly she had a perfectly overwhelming longing for Thomas, he was such an old stand-by—the one thing she knew she could always count upon, though, of course, he laughed at her a good deal; ever since she grew up he had been content to play the part of elder brother, to hear all about her love-affairs and problems, and give her advice and counsel: pretty magnanimous of him if he really cared for her himself as he professed to do. Of course she had never thought of being in love with him; she had known him too long and well. Love, she had believed, would be something strange, unimagined, unknown, and its object some hero, all fire, romance, and beauty, who would one day drop from the skies and claim her. Well, here was the unimagined, the unknown, the romantic, with a vengeance,—a perfect cyclone of it,—and in the very midst of it, swept on by its relentless power, she was sighing, longing, desperately praying for just one moment of the accustomed, the ordinary, the known and tried—in short, for Thomas. She would have given her life for just one reassuring tone of his voice, one touch of his hand on her arm, one glance from his humorous, dependable brown eyes, even if they were laughing at her.
Suddenly the need of him became so poignant, so desperate, that she began to call upon him, to cry out for him, just as if her voice could really carry through those two hundred miles of space; the want became a delirium, a frenzy, the muffled cries more wild and sharp; violently, without restraint, she shook and sobbed in Fult's arms.
Her storm of distress finally brought Fult to a halt.
"I allow the straps are hurting you," he said; "or maybe you are cramped. I reckon there's time for us to walk a piece; I'll take the strap off your feet and we'll walk a while, if you say so."
She nodded vehement acquiescence.
He dropped her gently from the mare's back, got off himself, and unfastened the strap from her ankles. Together they walked along the road, he leading the mare with one hand and steadying Isabel with the other. The moon, though not bright, gave light enough for them to see by, except in some denser shadows of the trees.
The relief of having her feet free was immense. Struggling with a mighty effort for self-control, she ceased sobbing, and after a while motioned for him to take off the gag.
At first he seemed unwilling, then said: "Hit couldn't hurt none, though; there hain't a human being in two or three mile to hear you if you was to holler. And I reckon I'm able to stand what you have to say to me about Lethie. Of course, I know you'll have a plenty."