Almost strangling in the fierce tenacity of her grasp, the wretch released Mr. Leith, and springing upward with a savage bound, threw his frail assailant from him into the middle of the room.
The terrible shock hurled her prostrate on the floor. She lay there stunned and bleeding, and the wretch, after one horror-struck glance at her, rushed from the room.
"Golden—it is Golden! and he has killed her" wailed her grandfather, falling on his knees beside her; and Richard Leith, where he lay, half dying, comprehended the anguished wail, and crawled on his hands and knees to the side of his hapless daughter.
It was little Golden, indeed, but she lay still and silent, with the blood oozing from her nostrils and a slight cut on her temple.
As he reached her side, old Dinah rushed into the room.
"Little missie, little missie!" she cried; then she stopped short in terror. "Oh, my Hebenly Master, who has done dis t'ing?"
"Dinah," her master said quickly, "go and send Fred Glenalvan to me."
She hobbled out obediently, and in a moment returned with the handsome young dandy, who glanced at his grandfather with haughty indifference.
"Fredrick," the old man said, with strange sternness, "here are two people whom your father has nearly killed. You must go and bring a doctor for them."
Frederick started at the sight of the bleeding forms upon the floor, but in an instant his countenance hardened into marble.