How could she ever have believed Lester Armstrong noble, good and true, a king among men?  Where was the tenderness in voice and manner that had won her heart from her, and his oft-repeated assurance that he cared for her for herself alone; that he wished to Heaven she were no heiress, but as poor as himself, that he might show her the power of his great love?  An hour ago—­only an hour ago—­yet it seemed the length of a lifetime in the shadowy past, she had crept out of the house to meet her lover at the trysting place, her heart beating with love for him, sobbing out to Heaven to send her true love quickly back to her.

As she had closed the door of the great mansion noiselessly behind her, she realized that she was putting wealth and luxury away from her deliberately and choosing a life of rigid economy with the lover whose earnings were, alas, so much smaller than even the pin money she had been accustomed to.

But with love to brighten the way, she felt that she could endure any hardship with noble Lester Armstrong, who loved her so dearly and devotedly.

After a time, perhaps, her father would forgive her for this step, and take her back to his home and heart, and welcome Lester, too.  She had read of such things.

The night air blew bitterly cold against her face as she stepped bravely forth, but she did not waver.

The great hall clock chimed the hour of ten, and her heart beat faster, for she said to herself that her lover was nearing the trysting place and she had not much time to spare.

“Good-by, papa,” she murmured, turning for an instant and looking up at his lighted window.  “Good-by, my stepmamma,” she whispered.  “You have always hated me and wished me out of the way.  I am going now, and you will rejoice.  Good-by, Claire,” she added, as her eyes wandered upward to the little lighted window in the western wing.  “You never hated me.  You always loved me as though we had indeed been sisters.  Good-by, kind old family servants.  You will all miss me, I know, but I am going to happiness and love.  What fate could be better?”

She waited some moments at the trysting place ere she heard the sound of crunching wheels on the snow.  A moment later she heard the welcome voice saying:  “Faynie, where are you?” The next instant she was folded in a pair of strong, masculine arms.

But as the owner of them touched her lips with his own Faynie had started back with a terrible feeling of faintness rushing over her.  For the first time her lover’s breath was strong with the odor of brandy.

And the voice, which was always so gentle, kind and endearing, was muttering something about “the cursed darkness of the night.”

No wonder the girl’s soul revolted, and that she changed her mind suddenly about the elopement, which was to make or mar her young life.  And what she heard after he forced her into the coach only added to the terror which had grown into her heart against him, and when she made that flying leap from the coach, her one cry to Heaven was that she might escape the man whom she had but so lately madly adored, but whom she now so thoroughly abhorred.