"You lie, false-hearted girl! You loved me well, and you love me still. Love can not be so quickly unlearned. It is ambition that tempted you from me—that love of gold that always cursed your weak nature!" he returned, scornfully, stinging her to retort, angrily:
"What then? You can not help yourself! A girl may take back her promise if she will, and there is no law to make her marry when she does not choose!"
He tightened his clasp on her wrists till she sobbed with pain, and bent his dark face, distorted with demoniac rage, close to hers, hissing:
"And with the poor excuse that there is no law against it, you break a human heart and wreck a human life as ruthlessly as you would trample a flower springing in your path. Are you not afraid?"
"Afraid—of what?" she murmured, uneasily; and her fair face, as the moonlight gleamed on it down through the leaves, was ghastly with sudden fear.
"Of—me!" he answered, with a mocking laugh that made her very blood run cold, as he continued: "I am tempted to kill you for your falsity, but not yet!—that is, I will wait till I see how things turn out. Perhaps," mockingly, "you will tell me if you expect to marry Lovelace Ellsworth?"
She faltered:
"No; he is engaged to my cousin."
"Are you speaking the truth?"
"Yes," she sobbed, nervously.
His midnight eyes flashed dangerously as he answered, menacingly:
"I hope that you are, and it will be well for you if you are, for, mind you, Ela Craye, there is, as you say, no law to punish you for what you have done to me, yet I mean to take justice into my own hands. You may never be mine, but I swear no other man shall ever possess you. Remember this that I tell you now: In the hour that you wed another, there will be murder done! Either your life or my rival's shall pay the forfeit for what you have done!"
"How dare you threaten me? Let me go! I—I—"
Ela began to sob hysterically, and then he caught her in his arms, clasping her fiercely, and kissing her in a sort of frenzy.
"One more kiss—for old time's sake! Do you remember how sweet our love used to be, Ela? You shall never forget it! I seal the memory of it on your brow with these last kisses fiery with my heart's passion! Nay, you dare not scream! The crowd would come rushing here, and you would not like to have them find you here in my arms!"
But Ela's fear of him made her frantic, and she began to shriek, though he stifled the sound with his kisses. Then sudden steps crashed through the undergrowth, and a man's tall form loomed up in the moonlight.
"What is that cry? Good heavens! Unhand that lady, you hound!" thundered Love Ellsworth, rushing on the scene, and clutching Ashley with such strength that he released his hold and staggered back from his victim.
Instantly Ela clung wildly to his arm, sobbing fearfully.
"You are safe now; but—good heavens! that wretch is escaping!" exclaimed Ellsworth, regretfully, as, hindered by her hold, he beheld Ashley making off into the woods, from whence the next minute a pistol shot whistled back, grazing Love's temple, and burying itself in the tree beyond.
A startled cry escaped him, and Ela wailed:
"Oh, that wretch! He has wounded you!"
"It is nothing—a mere scratch," he answered, a little nervously, putting his handkerchief to his brow to stanch a few drops of blood, as he added: "But I had a narrow escape certainly. But why did you venture so far from the light, Miss Craye? Your cousin has been searching for you everywhere, and at last sent me to find you. I heard your smothered shriek, and hastened to your assistance, just in time, it seemed. Was the fellow trying to rob you?"
"Yes," she faltered, nervously, glad of the pretext for hiding the truth. "But he did not succeed, thanks to your timely appearance on the scene. I am very sorry I strayed so far away. I was tempted by moonlight, and had not a thought of danger. Oh, believe me, I am very grateful for your aid; I will never forget it."
"Let us go and relieve your cousin's anxiety," Love returned, leading her away from the dark shadows of the trees back to the old church again, where the story of the dreadful highwayman created such a sensation that the gathering was soon broken up, every one departing for home, while many regrets were expressed that Miss Craye could not describe the appearance of her assailant clearly enough to lead to his identification.
CHAPTER XIII.
SAD FOREBODINGS
When Love and Dainty were parting in the hall that night, he detained her a few moments, saying:
"I must start early in the morning for Lewisburg, our county seat. It is twenty miles distant, and I shall not return until night. Do you think you can bear the day without me?" playfully.
"Must you really go?" she sighed.
"Yes; I have some business that must not be postponed. I would take you with me, darling, but it is a long drive over rough mountain roads, and would fatigue you too much. But I hate to leave you for a whole day, Dainty, and I shall be thinking of you all day," whispered the fond lover, longing to take her in his arms and bid her an ardent farewell, but deterred because his step-mother was lingering officiously close by.
They parted with a swift-stolen kiss when her head was turned, and Dainty went reluctantly enough to her room, dreading the almost nightly repeated experience with the grim ghost of Ellsworth.
She had grown to dread with a sickening terror the nights that were stealing some of the rose-bloom from her cheeks and the brightness from her violet eyes; but in her pride lest Love should deem her a coward, she would not yield to the longing to ask him to let her go home to her mother till the wedding day.
"It would be too great a triumph for my cruel rivals to have me go home now, and they would try to turn my lover's heart against me. Besides, now that he has written mamma to come, she will soon be with me, and then I shall not fear anything," she thought, as she entered the room reluctantly, hating the night and the company of the coarse Sheila Kelly, but too unwilling to spend the night alone to dismiss her from the room.
But to her surprise she was confronted by an aged negro woman with a kindly black face that beamed benevolence on the startled girl.
"Hi, honey, yo' look 'sprised ter see me in yo' room. Aine Massa Love tole you dat I gwine tek de place o' dat uppish Irish gal?" she exclaimed, gently.
Dainty smiled and shook her head. The old woman continued:
"Den I must interduce myse'f to yo', honey. My name is Virginny, but yo' kin call me Mammy, kase I been de black mammy o' two ginerations o' Ellsworfs—from Massa Love's pappy down to Massa Love heself—an' maybe I gwine lib to nuss his chillen, too. Hi, what yo' blushin' at? Won't yo' be proud when yo' an' Massa Love git married an' settle down, wif de little ones springing up around yo' like flowers, some wif sassy black eyes like deir pappy, an' some wif blue-vi'let eyes like deir mammy. Oh, I want to lib ter see dat day, an' ter rock dem in my ole arms, an' snuggle deir shiny heads up agin my breast, an' sing to dem like I done sing to deir pappy an' deir grandpappy," folding her arms on her breast and crooning musically: