CHAPTER XXX.

A DESPERATE PLAN.

Ethel’s plan was hastily revealed.  The position was exceedingly perilous; time was short, and this was the only way of escape.

It was the priest who had concocted it, and he had thought of it as the only plan by which Hawbury’s rescue could be effected.  This ingenious Irishman had also formed another plan for the rescue of Minnie and her sister, which was to be attempted in due course of time.

Now no ordinary mode of escape was possible for Hawbury.  A strict watch was kept.

The priest had noticed on his approach that guards were posted in different directions in such a way that no fugitive from the house could elude them.  He had also seen that the guard inside the house was equally vigilant.  To leap from the window and run for it would be certain death, for that was the very thing which the brigands anticipated.  To make a sudden rush down the stairs was not possible, for at the door below there were guards; and there, most vigilant of all, was Girasole himself.

The decision of the Irish priest was correct, as has been proved in the case of Dacres, who, in spite of all his caution, was observed and captured.  Of this the priest knew nothing, but judged from what he himself had seen on his approach to the house.

The plan of the priest had been hastily communicated to Ethel, who shared his convictions and adopted his conclusions.  She also had noticed the vigilance with which the guard had been kept up, and only the fact that a woman had been sent for and was expected with the priest had preserved her from discovery and its consequences.  As it was, however, no notice was taken of her, and her pretended character was assumed to be her real one.  Even Girasole had scarcely glanced at her.  A village peasant was of no interest in his eyes.  His only thought was of Minnie, and the woman that the priest brought was only used as a desperate effort to show a desire for her comfort.  After he had decided to separate the sisters the woman was of more importance; but he had nothing to say to her, and thus Ethel had effected her entrance to Minnie’s presence in safety, with the result that has been described.

The priest had been turning over many projects in his brain, but at last one suggested itself which had originated in connection with the very nature of his errand.

One part of that errand was that a man should be conveyed out of the house and carried away and left in a certain place.  Now the man who was thus to be carried out was a dead man, and the certain place to which he was to be borne and where he was to be left was the grave; but these stern facts did not at all deter the Irish priest from trying to make use of this task that lay before him for the benefit of Hawbury.

Here was a problem.  A prisoner anxious for escape, and a dead man awaiting burial; how were these two things to be exchanged so that the living man might pass out without going to the grave?