By this time the ladies were both at the bottom of the stairs.

"Come!" said Tozer; "hurry up, folks. I'll take one lady and you take t'other."

"Do you know the woods?"

"Like a book."

"So do I," said Dacres.

He grasped Mrs. Willoughby's hand and started.

"But Minnie!" said Mrs. Willoughby.

"You had better let him take her; it's safer for all of us," said Dacres.

Mrs. Willoughby looked back as she was dragged on after Dacres, and saw Tozer following them, holding Minnie's hand. This rea.s.sured her.

Dacres dragged her on to the foot of the bank. Here she tried to keep up with him, but it was steep, and she could not.

Whereupon Dacres stopped, and, without a word, raised her in his arms as though she were a little child, and ran up the bank. He plunged into the woods. Then he ran on farther. Then he turned and doubled.

Mrs. Willoughby begged him to put her down.

"No," said he; "they are behind us. You can not go fast enough. I should have to wait and defend you, and then we would both be lost."

"But, oh! we are losing Minnie."

"No, we are not," cried Dacres; "that man is ten times stronger than I am. He is a perfect elephant in strength. He dashed past me up the hill."

"I didn't see him."

"Your face was turned the other way. He is ahead of us now somewhere."

"Oh, I wish we _could_ catch up to him."

[Ill.u.s.tration: "AT THIS DACRES RUSHED ON FASTER."]

At this Dacres rushed on faster. The effort was tremendous. He leaped over fallen timbers, he burst through the underbrush.

"Oh, I'm sure you'll _kill_ yourself if you go so fast," said Mrs.

Willoughby. "We can't catch up to them."

At this Dacres slackened his pace, and went on more carefully. She again begged him to put her down. He again refused. Upon this she felt perfectly helpless, and recalled, in a vague way, Minnie's ridiculous question of "How would you like to be run away with by a great, big, horrid man, Kitty darling?"

Then she began to think he was insane, and felt very anxious.

At last Dacres stopped. He was utterly exhausted. He was panting terribly. It had been a fearful journey. He had run along the bank up to that narrow valley which he had traversed the day before, and when he stopped it was on the top of that precipice where he had formerly rested, and where he had nurtured such dark purposes against Mrs.

Willoughby.

Mrs. Willoughby looked at him, full of pity. He was utterly broken down by this last effort.

"Oh dear!" she thought. "Is he sane or insane? What _am_ I to do? It is dreadful to have to go on and humor his queer fancies."

CHAPTER x.x.xVII.

MINNIE'S LAST LIFE-PRESERVER.

When Tozer started after Dacres he led Minnie by the hand for only a little distance. On reaching the acclivity he seized her in his arms, thus imitating Dacres's example, and rushed up, reaching the top before the other. Then he plunged into the woods, and soon became separated from his companion.

Once in the woods, he went along quite leisurely, carrying Minnie without any difficulty, and occasionally addressing to her a soothing remark, a.s.suring her that she was safe. Minnie, however, made no remark of any kind, good or bad, but remained quite silent, occupied with her own thoughts. At length Tozer stopped and put her down. It was a place upon the edge of a cliff on the sh.o.r.e of the lake, and as much as a mile from the house. The cliff was almost fifty feet high, and was perpendicular. All around was the thick forest, and it was unlikely that such a place could be discovered.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "'WORSE AND WORSE,' SAID TOZER."]

"Here," said he; "we've got to stop here, and it's about the right place. We couldn't get any where nigh to the soldiers without the brigands seeing us; so we'll wait here till the fight's over, and the brigands all chased off."

"The soldiers! what soldiers?" asked Minnie.

"Why, they're having a fight over there--the soldiers are attacking the brigands."

"Well, I didn't know. n.o.body told me. And did you come with the soldiers?"

"Well, not exactly. I came with the priest and the young lady."

"But you were not at the house?"

"No. They wouldn't take me all the way. The priest said I couldn't be disguised--but I don't see why not--so he left me in the woods till he came back. And then the soldiers came, and we crept on till we came nigh the lake. Well, then I stole away; and when they made an attack the brigands all ran there to fight, and I watched till I saw the coast clear; and so I came, and here we are."

Minnie now was quite silent and preoccupied, and occasionally she glanced sadly at Tozer with her large, pathetic, child-like eyes. It was a very piteous look, full of the most tender entreaty. Tozer occasionally glanced at her, and then, like her, he sat silent, involved in his own thoughts.

"And so," said Minnie at last, "you're not the priest himself?"

"The priest?"

"Yes."

"Well, no; I don't call myself a priest. I'm a minister of the Gospel."

"Well, you're not a _real_ priest, then."

"All men of my calling are real priests--yes, priests and kings. I yield to no man in the estimate which I set upon my high and holy calling."

"Oh, but I mean a Roman Catholic priest," said Minnie.

"A Roman Catholic priest! Me! Why, what a question! Me! a Roman Catholic! Why, in our parts folks call me the Protestant Champion."