"On what account, my dear young lady?"
"I'll tell you as quick as I can. I had just obtained admission to-day to Virginia's room for the first time, when, after having spent the time, and more, allotted to me by the doctor, as I was coming down the stairs I had to pass the door of Sir William's library, and I accidentally overheard him giving orders to an officer to collect some soldiers from the barracks and make you a prisoner in this house. How he knew you were here I know not; but I was no sooner out of the door than I flew to the back court below, demanded of the servant holding your horse to point out your room, and rushed in in this strange manner to put you on your guard. Now, fly for your life—you have not a moment to lose!"
"One word of Virginia, your fair friend, and I am gone. Will she survive? Is her reason unsettled? Does she believe the strange story of the Recluse?"
"In a word then, she is better—of sound mind, and in her heart does not believe one word of that story, though sober reason is strangely perplexed."
"One word more, and I have done. Does she inquire for me?"
"The very first word she said to me was, 'Does Nathaniel believe it?' Now go, while yet you may. Should any new emergency arise in your absence I will despatch a courier after you."
"Yet one message to Virginia. Tell her that I have accidentally discovered in the trinket preserved by her father, and worn by me in the days of my infancy, the likeness of her whom I have every reason to believe my mother. Tell her not to hope too sanguinely, but to give that circumstance its weight, and trust to the developments of time; and now I commit you both, my dearest friends, to the protection of an overruling Providence; farewell."
With these parting words he rushed down stairs, mounted his fleet charger, and swiftly left the court just as the Governor's emissaries entered the front porch of the house to arrest him.
Harriet drew her veil closely over her face, and almost as fleetly sought her father's dwelling.
Our hero in a very few minutes placed the river which separates the island from the main land between him and his pursuers. The sun was yet above the western horizon, and the clouds which spread in fleecy and stationary masses, were tinted with the softest hues of the violet and the rose, filling the mind with pleasing images of repose, cheerfulness, and hope. These soothing and delightful influences of the summer evening were in a great measure lost however upon our hero as he pursued his solitary way through the unbroken forest in the immediate footsteps of the army.