“Hal! Hal!” she exclaimed, in a tone of doubt, yet of strong hope.
“It is even I, dear Flora,” he ejaculated, hoarsely, through his parched lips.
She flung her arms about his neck, and cried, passionately—
“Save me! save me! Hal, save me!”
“You are saved,” he murmured, almost inaudibly; and burying his face on her shoulder, gave way to a paroxysm of scalding tears.
It was but for a moment that this weakness overcame him. Had he not suffered the gush of emotion to have its course, he had fallen back in a fit.
He sprang to his feet, and raising up Flora, conducted her to his horse. He called to his companion the agent, and bade him remain at the scene of disaster until he sent up help to him; and, as there was yet some three miles to traverse before he could reach the house—a lone one—where it had been Colonel Mires’ intention to stay for some hours, if not all night, he mounted his horse, and placing Flora before him, went at an easy canter from the terrible spot.
Oh, that short ride of three miles. Never before did he experience such unalloyed happiness as he enjoyed during the brief term occupied in proceeding from the place of accident to the inn.
Flora, saved from a horrible death, was in his arms—his left encircled her small waist, and her two soft hands met and clasped about his neck. Her now flushed cheek rested against his, and her gentle eyes looked into his own with an expression of loving tenderness and a perfect sense of security.
She was unconscious as yet of the fate of Colonel Mires or his servants. She knew that she had been on the eve of some dreadful accident. She had a shadowy sense of a violent crash, but nothing more. She had no wish to learn what had really happened. It was enough to know that she had been wrested from the villanous custody of Colonel Mires and by Hal—that was all she cared for, she sought for no more information: and Vivian, who was pretty well acquainted with the details, forbore, in her highly nervous state, to shock her by repeating them to her.