“Thank you; but indeed I must go at once and dress for tea,” Elsie said, consulting her watch.  “You are not going yet?”

“No, he will stay to tea,” said Rose.

“But must go soon after, as I have an engagement,” added Arthur.

Elsie met her father in the hall.  “Ah, you are at home again,” he remarked with a pleased look; “that is well; I was beginning to think you were making it very late.”

“But you are not uneasy when I am in such good hands, papa?”

“No, not exactly; but like better to take care of you myself.”

The clock was just striking eight as Arthur mounted and rode away from his brother’s door.  It was not a dark night, or yet very light; for though the moon had risen, dark clouds were scudding across the sky, allowing but an occasional glimpse of her face, and casting deep shadows over the landscape.

In the partial obscurity of one of these, and only a few rods ahead of him, when about half-way between the Oaks and Roselands, Arthur thought he discovered the figure of a man standing by the roadside, apparently waiting to halt him as he passed.

“Ha! you’ll not take me by surprise, my fine fellow, whoever you may be,” muttered Arthur between his set teeth, drawing out a revolver and cocking it, “Halloo there!  Who are you; and what d’ye want?” he called, as his horse brought him nearly opposite the suspicious looking object.

“Your money or your life, Dinsmore,” returned the other with a coarse laugh.  “Don’t pretend not to know me, old chap.”

“You!” exclaimed Arthur, with an oath, but half under his breath.  “I thought you were safe in——­”

“State prison, eh?  Well, so I was, but they’ve pardoned me out.  I was a reformed character, you see; and then my vote was wanted at the last election, ha! ha!  And so I’ve come down to see how my old friends are getting along.”

“Friends! don’t count me among them!” returned Arthur, hastily; “jail-birds are no mates for me.”

“No, I understand that, the disgrace is in being caught.  But you’d as well keep a civil tongue in your head; for if you’re covering me with a revolver, I’m doing the same by you.”

“I’m not afraid of you, Tom,” answered Arthur, with a scornful laugh, “but I’m in a hurry; so be good enough to move out of the way and let me pass.”  For the other had now planted himself in the middle of the road, and laid a heavy hand upon the horse’s bridle-rein.

“When I’ve said my say; no sooner.  So that pretty niece of yours, my former fiancee, is engaged to Travilla? the man whom, of all others, I hate with a hatred bitterer than death.  I would set my heel upon his head and grind it into the earth as I would the head of a venomous reptile.”

“Who told you?”

“I overheard some o’ their sweet talk as they rode by here not two hours ago.  He robbed me of her that he might snatch the prize himself; I saw his game at the time.  But he shall never get her,” he concluded, grinding his teeth with rage.