Leonard Yorke’s heart leaped up into his throat. Could he have been on the wrong track all this time?
“What is the matter, old fellow?” he cried, feeling all at once a wild desire to do something, anything, everything, for this man, whom, until this moment, he had madly, unreasonably hated. “How came you here?”
Will tried to lift his head, but he was too weak. An awful, ghastly pallor overspread his face, and he fell back upon the ground once more at Leonard’s feet.
“I—I was coming to her rescue,” he murmured in a half whisper, speaking with great difficulty. “For—oh, it is you, Yorke?” for the first time recognizing his companion. “I am glad you are here, for you will help to find her now. That man, that villain, I don’t really know who he is, but it is some one whom Miss Arleigh fears and hates, has carried her away!”
“What?”
Leonard Yorke thundered forth the word like a madman.
“Explain!” he panted, fiercely.
“Very well, I will speak as rapidly and lucidly as possible, Yorke, but I’ll confess I am pretty badly done up, and it is very difficult to speak. You know, perhaps, that I called at Yorke Towers last night to see Miss Jessie Glyndon? I wished to bid her good-bye, as I intended going over to Texas to remain. I’ll tell you why: I love Jessie Glyndon, and I fear that I shall never win her, she is so cold and proud, and reserved. It is evident to me that she has heard frightful tales concerning me. Some may be true, I am sorry to say, but no doubt they have come to her highly spiced, and make me out much worse than I am, or ever have been. Leonard, if I could win that woman for my wife, I swear that I would be a better man, that I would turn over a new clean leaf in the history of my life. Well, I called to see Jessie, and I met Miss Arleigh in the grounds. She was running away from some one who had frightened her, a tall dark man in a military cloak. She was frightened half to death, and as I turned the corner of the avenue which leads to the house, she nearly fell into my arms. After I had quieted her, I begged her to let me see Jessie for a few moments, and like the dear, good young lady that she is—she is an angel, Leonard—she proposed to help me.
“Her plan was to go into the house and try and coax Jessie out into the grounds; once there, she would leave us alone, and we might be able to come to an understanding. She did all as she had proposed. Jessie and I were sitting under the magnolia-tree near the library windows, when we heard a fearful shriek which seemed to come from your mother’s room. Jessie rushed to her assistance. I would have followed, but she bid me not to come, and knowing that you were in the house to assist in the emergency, and thinking that it might be embarrassing for Jessie, I obeyed her, and with a hasty good-bye, I left her. I hastened away from Yorke Towers, and attempting to take the shorter route, I lost my way. About an hour afterward, while knocking about in the woods, I came face to face with the same man who had frightened Miss Arleigh, and he was carrying her in his arms. She was, to all appearance, unconscious. I stepped boldly up to him and called him to account. But he struck me over the head with something which he drew from his pocket—I think it was a sand-bag—and I fell to the ground like a dead thing. He must have brought me to this forsaken place and left me. I do not know, for I became insensible, and knew no more until I opened my eyes just now to see you bending over me. That is my story, told to the best of my ability. Where Miss Arleigh is now, I do not know.”
Leonard grasped Will’s hand in a firm grip.