“The wedding and all the accompanying round of dissipation.  Now I hope we can settle down to quiet home pleasures for the rest of the winter.”

“So do I, and that I shall see twice as much of you as I have of late.  You can have no idea how I missed you while you were absent.  And I am more than half envious of our bride and groom.  Shall our trip be to Europe, Elsie?”

“Are we to take a trip?” she asked with an arch smile.

“That will be as you wish, dearest, of course.”

“I don’t wish it now, nor do you, I know; but we shall have time enough to settle all such questions.”

“Plenty; I only wish we had not so much.  Yet I don’t mean to grumble; the months will soon slip away and bring the time when I may claim my prize.”

They were riding towards the Oaks; the sun had just set, and the moon was still below the horizon.

Elsie suddenly reined in her horse, Mr. Travilla instantly doing likewise, and turned a pale, agitated face upon him.  “Did you hear that?” she asked low and tremulously.

“What, dear child?  I heard nothing but the sound of our horses’ hoofs, the sighing of the wind in the tree-tops, and our own voices.”

“I heard another; a muttered oath and the words, ’You shall never win her.  I’ll see to that.’  The tones were not loud but deep, and the wind seemed to carry the sounds directly to my ear,” she whispered, laying a trembling little hand on his arm, and glancing nervously from side to side.

“A trick of the imagination, I think, dearest; but from whence did the sounds seem to come?”

“From yonder thicket of evergreens and—­I knew the voice for that of your deadly foe, the man from whom you and papa rescued me in Landsdale.”

“My child, he is expiating his crime in a Pennsylvania penitentiary.”

“But may he not have escaped, or have been pardoned out?  Don’t, oh don’t, I entreat you!” she cried, as he turned his horse’s head in the direction of the thicket.  “You will be killed.”

“I am armed, and a dead shot,” he answered, taking a revolver from his breast pocket.

“But he is in ambush, and can shoot you down before you can see to aim at him.”

“You are right, if there is really an enemy concealed there,” he answered, returning the revolver to its former resting-place; “but I feel confident that it was either a trick of the imagination with you, or that some one is playing a practical joke upon us.  So set your tears at rest, dear child, and let us hasten on our way.”

Elsie yielded to his better judgment, trying to believe it nothing worse than a practical joke; but had much ado to quiet her agitated nerves and recover her composure before a brisk canter brought them to the Oaks, and she must meet her father’s keen eye.

They found Arthur in the drawing-room, chatting with Rose.  He rose with a bland, “Good-evening,” and gallantly handed Elsie to a seat.  Arthur was a good deal changed since his recall from college; and in nothing more than in his manner to Elsie; he was now always polite; often cordial even when alone with her.  He was not thoroughly reformed, but had ceased to gamble and seldom drank to intoxication.