She stood still, gazing at that thing in heaven.
“Well, what has become of the man, dear?” asked Rebekah.
“I can't make out....But I should like to marry that man”.
“Ah, if wishes were fathers, we should all have babies, Ruth, to say our kaddish”.
“Oh, look—!” cried Margaret.
A rabbit had rushed across a path ahead, and she ran that way beyond a bend....When Rebekah followed she had disappeared.
On Rebekah's outcry all set to search wood, path, river—she was gone; but after five minutes a voice a long way off in the wood, singing:
“O what a pretty place,
And what a graceful city....”
on which the two youths flew toward the sound, and presently the rest, following, heard a shout, a cry, then silence, till one of the young men came running back, his face washed in blood: he had seen some forms, and, as he had approached, been struck on the brow, his brother felled. When all came to where the brother lay insensible, no sign of Margaret; nor could villagers and police, searching through the night, find her.
She had gone without surprise with her four captors, who had carried her to a cottage of boarded-up windows: and the same hour Hogarth had the news.