There was a ring of triumph in his tone that Mollie could not fail to perceive.  Her heart gave a great jump of terror, but she angrily flung herself out of his arm.

“Keep your distance, sir!  How dare you?  You sing quite a new song since I saw you last!  Don’t you lay a finger on me, or I’ll—­”

“What, pretty Cricket?” with a sardonic laugh.

Mollie caught her breath.  That name, that tone—­both were altogether new in the unknown man.

The sound of the voice, now that he spoke French, was quite unlike that of the man she had come to meet.  And he was not wont to call her Cricket.

Had she made some horrible mistake—­been caught in some dreadful trap?  But, no; that was impossible.

“Look here, Mr. Mask,” said Mollie, fiercely, “I don’t want any of your familiarity, and I trust to your honor to respect my unprotected situation.  I appointed this meeting because you kept your word, and behaved with tolerable decency when we last parted.  I want to end this matter.  I want to know who you are.”

“My precious Mollie, your husband!”

“But who are you?”

“One of your rejected suitors.”

“But which of them?—­there were so many.”

“The one who loved you best.”

“Pshaw!  I don’t want trifling!  What is your name?”

“Ernest.”

“I never had a lover of that name,” said Mollie, decidedly.  “You are only mocking me.  Are you—­are you—­Hugh Ingelow?”

Her voice shook a little.  The man by her side noted it, and burst into a derisive laugh.

“You are not Hugh Ingelow!” Mollie cried in a voice of sharp, sudden pain—­“you are not!”

“And you are sorry, pretty Mollie?  Why, that’s odd, too!  He was a rejected lover, was he not?”

“Let me out!” exclaimed the girl, frantically—­“let me go!  I thought you were Hugh Ingelow, or I never would have come!  Let me out!  Let me out!”

She made a rush at the door, with a shrill cry of affright.  A sudden panic had seized her—­a horrible dread of the man beside her—­a stunning sense that it was not the man she loved.

Again that strident laugh—­mocking, sardonic, triumphant—­rang through the carriage.  Her arms were caught and held as in a vise.

“Not so fast, my fair one; there is no escape:  I can’t live without you, and I see no reason why a man should live without his wife.  You appointed this meeting yourself, and I’m excessively obliged to you.  I am taking you to the sea-side to spend the honey-moon.  Don’t struggle so—­we’ll return to New York by and by.  As for Hugh Ingelow, you mustn’t think of him now; it isn’t proper in a respectable married woman to know there is another man in the scheme of the universe except her husband.  Mollie!  Mollie! if you scream in that manner you’ll compel me to resort to chloroform—­a vulgar alternative, my dearest.”

But Mollie struggled like a mad thing, and screamed—­wild, shrill, womanly shrieks that rang out even above the rattle and roll of the carriage wheels.