But her yearning arms touched empty air, and she found herself resting on a hard and narrow mattress, while her eyes, growing accustomed to the feeble light, showed her the bare stone wall of a narrow chamber like a dungeon, whose only ventilation came from narrow slits in the heavy oaken door.
Half-dazed, the girl lay and gazed about her unfamiliar surroundings until, suddenly overpowered with terror, she shrieked aloud, and springing up, dashed herself against the hard, unyielding door in the wild desire of escape.
In vain! The pressure of her light form did not even shake the heavy, cell-like door that was securely locked on the outside.
She could only sink back upon the narrow cot, while a terrified realization of the truth forced itself on her bewildered senses.
She was a prisoner in some unknown dungeon, locked away from her beloved forever.
The spite and malice of her enemies had triumphed at last. They had parted her from Love before the dawn of her wedding-day. The second attempt to kidnap her must have succeeded well, for she could remember nothing of how she had been brought here.
"Ah! I comprehend all now!" she cried, despairingly. "That pitcher of ice-water last night had somehow a bitter taste. We were drugged—mamma and I—and I was stolen away in the hope of preventing my marriage to Love, so that one of my rivals might be forced on him in my stead, lest he lose his inheritance!"
Then, in spite of her misery, a sweet, mocking laugh dimpled the girl's lips, as she added, gratefully:
"Oh, what a clever thought it was of Love's, that secret marriage! I feared I did wrong letting him persuade me into it; but I see now his presentiments of evil had good ground, and he did wisely in making me his wife two weeks ago."
She clasped her dimpled hands together in a sort of ecstacy, as she continued: