He did not see her, however, and when the two were driving rapidly away she was as vivacious as ever; Helen had fought yet one more conflict, and her companion was not skilled enough in the study of character to perceive that it was a desperate and hysterical kind of animation.  Poor Helen was facing gigantic shadows just then, and life wore its most fearful and menacing look to her; she had plunged so far in her contest that it was now a battle for life and death, and with no quarter.  She had made the choice of “Der Atlas,” of endless joy or endless sorrow, and in her struggle to keep the joy she was becoming more and more frantic, more and more terrified at the thought of the other possibility.  She knew that to fail now would mean shame and misery more overwhelming than she could bear, and so she was laughing and talking with frenzied haste; and every now and then she would stop and shudder, and then race wildly on,—­

  “Like one, that on a lonesome road
    Doth walk in fear and dread,
  And having once turned round walks on,
    And turns no more his head;
  Because he knows a frightful fiend
    Doth close behind him tread.”

And so all through the ride, because the girl’s shame and fear haunted her more and more, she became more and more hysterical, and more and more desperate; and Mr. Harrison thought that he had never seen her so brilliant, and so daring, and so inspired; nor did he have the least idea how fearfully overwrought she was, until suddenly as they came to a fork in the road he took a different one than she expected, and she clutched him wildly by the arm.  “Why do you do that?” she almost screamed.  “Stop!”

“What?” he asked in surprise.  “Take this road?”

“Yes!” exclaimed Helen.  “Stop!  Stop!”

“But it’s only half a mile or so farther,” said Mr. Harrison, reining up his horses, “and I thought you’d like the change.”

“Yes,” panted Helen, with more agitation than ever.  “But I can’t,—­we’d have to go through Hilltown!”

The wondering look of course did not leave the other’s face at that explanation.  “You object to Hilltown?” he asked.

“Yes,” said Helen, shuddering; “it is a horrible place.”

“Why, I thought it was a beautiful town,” laughed he.  “But of course it is for you to say.”  Then he gazed about him to find a place to turn the carriage.  “We’ll have to go on a way,” he said.  “The road is too narrow here.  I’m sorry I didn’t ask you, but I had no idea it made any difference.”

They continued, however, for fully a mile, and the road remained narrow, so that there was danger of upsetting in the ditch if they tried to turn.  “What do you wish me to do?” Mr. Harrison asked with a smile.  “The more we go on the longer it will take us if we are to go back, and I may miss my train; is your prejudice against Hilltown so very strong, Miss Davis?”

“Oh, no,” Helen answered, with a ghastly smile.  “Pray go on; it’s of no consequence.”