While they consulted, several of the attorney-general's men galloped up. They had been delayed and sent astray by a false message purporting to come from him. But they had met with no harm and were now in time to help in lifting the wounded man's helpless weight into the priest's saddle. This was the best plan that could be devised in haste, and Father Orin hastily mounted behind the unconscious body, to hold it in place. He being much the strongest among the men, the duty naturally fell to him. It was also natural that the double burden should be laid upon Toby, because the heaviest burdens of life are always laid upon those who are readiest to bear them.

And Toby appeared to feel his responsibility, for, setting out at a rapid pace, which seemed to show that he knew the need of haste, he yet moved with so steady a step that Father Orin did not require the aid of the other hands which were held out to help him. Nevertheless, every hand was constantly in readiness, and all kept close together; so that thus moving through the dim light, the shadowy mounted figures looked like some fabulous monster of gigantic size and with many arms, all extended toward a common burden. But the pony kept closest to Toby's side and in the gloom that followed the going down of the Hunter's Moon, a trembling little hand stole out now and then, to touch the still, cold one which swung so pathetically over Father Orin's strong arm.

The stars were paling, and the dark east was growing wan, when Cedar House rose at last out of the gray shadows. At the first glimpse of it Ruth suddenly sent the pony forward and urging him to a run, left the others far behind. Reaching the house, she leapt to the ground and ran to the front door. It was deeply in shadow, but she did not need sight to find the latch string, which she had played with as a child, and in another instant she stood in the great dark room. It was deserted all the household being asleep, and never dreaming that she also was not safely in bed. The fire had been covered as it always was at night, but it blazed when she stirred it, and by the light of the flame she found a candle on the tall mantelpiece. Holding this to the blaze, it seemed to her as if it would never catch the flame. When the wick caught she went running up the stairs with the lighted candle in her hand, arousing the sleeping household by repeated calls. She did not pause to answer the alarmed cries that came in response. She heard a scream from Miss Penelope's room, with, muffled sounds from the widow Broadnax's, and the disapproving tones of William Pressley's voice. But she was utterly heedless of everything, except the necessity of getting the room ready in time, so that there should be no waiting before doing what might be done. She quivered with terror to think how long the delay had been already. The servants were too far away to be summoned quickly, so that there was only herself to do what must be done, and she set about it in desperate haste. Hers was the only chamber that could be given him. Every room in Cedar House was occupied, and it was always her room which was given to a guest, so that she often slept on a couch in Miss Penelope's chamber. But she did not think of that; there was no thought of herself, beyond wishing to give him her own room. Had there been ever so many guest chambers, she would still have wished him to have hers. But to get it ready in time! To make sure that there should be no further waiting before doing all that human power could do. Even now it might be too late. The wood fire had almost burned out, and to kindle a blaze was the first thing to be done, so that she ran straight to the hearth and dropped on her knees beside it. There was a little heap of sticks in the chimney-corner, but her hands trembled so that she could hardly put them on the dying coals. The breath that she coaxed the flame with came in gasps, but a blaze quickly sprang up and leapt among the sticks, and then she flew to prepare the bed. If she might only get it ready before they came! The thought of that helpless head lying against Father Orin's shoulder was like a stab at her heart.

Footsteps were rushing up and down stairs, and excited voices were calling her name all over the house, but she did not pause or turn from her task. It was Miss Penelope who first found her and clamored to know what had happened; but she did not stop to answer, and went on turning back the covers of the bed—the last thing needing to be done—and listening for the sounds of the horses' hoofs. They could now be heard approaching with that sad, slow, solemn rhythm—that subdued beat, beat, beat, of horses' feet—which has fallen on all our bruised hearts as an awful part of the funeral march. She ran out of the room and downstairs, drawing her skirt away from Miss Penelope's frightened grasp, and passing William Pressley, as if his restraining words had been no more than the gusty wind. She was waiting outside when the three horsemen drew up at the door. The burden which they bore was still apparently lifeless, and with a sickening pang of fear she bent over the parted lips as they lowered him from the saddle, thinking for one despairing moment that he no longer breathed. But the faint flutter went on, and she gave way so that he might be borne up the stairs, and running before, she told them where to lay him down.

William Pressley made one or two efforts to direct what was being done, and although the girl's passionate excitement swept him aside, he still did what he could, and offered to furnish a fresh horse for the quicker fetching of the doctor, when the attorney-general said he would go for him at once. It was like William Pressley to do this; it would have been unlike him to neglect any duty that he saw. But the offering of the horse and the full performance of his own duty did not keep him from looking at Ruth in severe displeasure. He did not yet know how this thing had happened, and was far from suspecting that she had been out of the house that night. Yet it disturbed and angered him to see her flying here and there, and running to and fro to get things that were wanted, as though the servants could not be quick enough. With all this in his tone, he coldly and strongly urged her to join the rest of the family, pointing out the fact that there was nothing more to be done by any one till the doctor should come. But she merely shook her head, without speaking, and slid softly into a seat by the bedside, and there William Pressley left her, disdaining to contend. She thought that she was alone—so far as she thought of herself at all—but the boy sat unseen and forgotten in a shadowed corner of the chamber. He was gazing at her, but her gaze never once wandered from the still white face on the pillow.

The rest of the family were gathered around the hearth in the great room downstairs. The judge had been summoned from the cabin in which he slept, and he was now plying Father Orin with questions. There was a cry of alarmed amazement when the priest told of finding Ruth at Anvil Rock. Only William Pressley said nothing, and sat perfectly still, with a sudden stiffening of his bearing. It was not easy for the priest to make the whole story clear, for he did not understand it quite clearly himself. But he told as much as he knew of the night's events. And when he was done, the judge's voice stilled the clamor of the other excited voices.

"How can the child have known what was going on? Where is she? We must find out at once how she came to do so wild and strange a thing. What under heaven could she have been doing there—in such a place, at such a time? Where is she?" But he went on with another thought, without waiting for an answer. "How can those murderous scoundrels have known that the attorney-general would ride to Anvil Rock alone? It is plain enough that they did know. The question is—How? By what means can they possibly have learned anything about the plan? That's the thing! How did they find out enough to enable them to set this villanous trap? All those assassins hidden there in the darkness of the Cypress Swamp, waiting to spring out on one man!" He turned suddenly to the priest. "What is your opinion, Father? Have you the slightest idea how they could have learned anything of our plan?"

Father Orin looked straight at William Pressley.

"Yes, I have an idea," he said quietly, with his gaze still fixed on the young lawyer. "But it is merely unfounded suspicion. I have no real reason for my suspicions."

"Well, what are they?" asked the judge, eagerly. "You can hardly be afraid of doing any injustice to those scoundrels. It would be hard to suspect such murderous villains of any sneaking treachery that they wouldn't be guilty of if they could. How do you think they found out? That's what I want to know."

Father Orin was still looking steadily at William Pressley, who returned the look just as steadily with one that was easier to read than the priest's. William Pressley's gaze expressed a large, patient tolerance for prejudice, slightly touched with calm contempt, and there was no doubting its entire sincerity.

"I think," said Father Orin, slowly, "that these banded robbers and murderers must have learned of the plan through some one's inadvertence. It is my opinion that the plan was betrayed by some one who did not mean to betray it, and who may not have known what he had done."

William Pressley regarded him with an incredulous smile. "It is hardly likely that the plan can have been revealed in any such way as you suggest, sir," he said, with the politeness which is more exasperating than rudeness. "You are certainly overlooking the fact that only a few knew what the attorney-general intended to do, and that those who did know are the ablest and most reliable men in the country. It is therefore utterly out of the question to assume that any one among them, any man of their intelligence and standing, could have made such a blunder. Really, my dear sir, if you will pardon my saying so, the idea is absurd."

The priest made no reply and his eyes were still fixed on the young lawyer's face, but as he gazed, the expression of his own face changed. A half smile lighted it for a moment. The good man's sense of humor was keen. But this passed quickly and in its stead there came the compassion which any purely human weakness, however great or small, always awoke in his truly compassionate breast.

The judge apparently had not heard what his nephew said. He always began to feel impatient as soon as the young man commenced to speak. And he now gave his tousled head the old, unconscious toss, like a horse shaking his mane at the lighting of a persistent fly. And then, paying no more attention to William Pressley and drawing his chair nearer Father Orin's, he went on with the grave talk. It was he, however, who did all the talking now; the priest had suddenly become a passive listener. He had no more ideas to advance.

The three men turned many anxious looks on the open door. It was still a framed space of misty gray, filled only with the melancholy mystery of the wintry dawn. It seemed to the watchers to stay unchanged for a long time, as it always does to those who watch for its brightening in trouble and anxiety. Yet while they longed for the light they dreaded to see it, as the troubled and alarmed always dread, lest it should reveal something terrible which the darkness has concealed. Their words grew fewer, also, under this strain of waiting, and they gradually fell into the tone that night watchers use, when they speak of mysterious things under the gloomy spell of this sad half-light which is neither night nor day. In the silences between their hesitating words, they bent forward and listened. All was still—there was no distant sound of the attorney-general's return or of the old doctor's coming. In the tense stillness they could hear only the sad murmur of the river gliding under the darkness and—now and then—the sudden hurrying of footsteps in the chamber overhead where the wounded man lay.

And so a long, heavy hour dragged by. The leaden gray framed by the doorway began to glimmer with a silvery pallor. The quicker breath of the awakening world sent a heavier shower of leaves from the trees. The birds still lingering among the cold, bare branches were already awake, and calling cheerily to one another, as if the higher world in which they lived was all untouched by the struggle and strife of this lower human world. The heavy-hearted men in the great room of Cedar House listened with the vague wistfulness that the happiness of bird voices always brings to the troubled. They also heard the low trumpeting of the swans as the breath of the morning swayed the rushes and that, too, filled them with a deeper longing for peace. But suddenly the far-off echo of a horse's rapid approach made them forget everything else. The doctor was coming at last! As one man, the three men sprang to open the door, and leapt out into the pallid daylight. The horseman was now near by and in another moment they saw that the rider was not the doctor, nor yet the attorney-general, but Philip Alston.

The priest shrank back with an uncontrollable recoil and then stood still and silent, watching every movement of the tall figure which had reined up and was dismounting with the ease of a boy. The judge and his nephew had made an exclamation at the sight of him; but they were merely surprised at the unusual hour of his appearance and he explained this at once.

"Where is Ruth? What is wrong? Has anything happened?" he asked, turning in visible agitation from one to another. "What was it that those men on horseback brought here? I could barely make out something moving this way. Has anything happened to Ruth? The light was dim, and I was a long way off. I was coming from the river where I had been attending to the loading of a boat, and so happened to see that something was going on. But I wasn't near enough to tell what it was. Of course I came at once to see if there was any trouble, and to do what I could. Is anything wrong with Ruth? My horse fell and lamed himself, or I should have been here much sooner. Tell me instantly! What have you done with the child? What have you allowed to happen to her? By God, if—"

He demanded this accounting in a tone of passionate fierceness such as none of those present had ever heard in him, turning first upon William Pressley and then upon Robert Knox. His face was white, and his eyes were blazing, and they did not at once resume their natural look when he had been assured of Ruth's safety. But he said nothing more, and only Father Orin noted how altered and worn and old he looked, when he entered the room and the brighter light fell upon him.

He came to the fireside and sat down with the light of a swinging lamp falling full on his face. His clear blue eyes, growing quiet, now looked straight into Father Orin's—which were openly searching and suspicious—during the second telling of the story of the night. It was not easy for suspicion to stand against such a gaze. The priest's wavered in spite of its strength. No one could believe evil of Philip Alston while looking in his noble, open face. He did not speak immediately after the story was told. When he did, it was to say, quietly and naturally, precisely what any right-minded man would have said under the circumstances:—

"This young stranger is certainly a man of courage. He has protected the attorney-general at the risk of his own life. In doing this, he has done a great service for all of us—for the whole country. We must now do what we can for him. Is he badly, hurt? Where is he? Who is with him?"

The priest saw that he flinched for the first time when told that the wounded man had been taken to Ruth's room.

"That was wrong," said Philip Alston, with a subtle change in his tone. "Ruth must have nothing further to do with this extraordinary and most unfortunate affair. She has had far too much to do with it already. That mooning, foolish boy must have led her into this romantic folly through some girlish enthusiasm about Joe Daviess, the popular hero of romance. It is plainly the boy's fault that she was induced to do so dangerous and unheard-of a thing. She could never have thought of it herself. I shall see that he keeps his place hereafter. We must look to it, William," turning upon the young man with more severity than his voice often expressed. "Where is she? What is she doing? I wish to see her."

It was the judge who told him that she was in her own room, together with the older ladies, all in attendance upon the injured man. The priest then saw the second swift darkening of Philip Alston's face.

"I will go up to her room," he said quietly. "I wish to be sure that she has not been harmed."

As he rose, there was a sound outside. He turned to the open door and saw two horsemen approaching at a gallop. It was light enough for him to see and recognize the attorney-general and the doctor. The other men hurriedly went out to meet them. Philip Alston stood still in a shadowed corner of the great room, while the rest hastened up the stairway and into the chamber where Paul Colbert lay. And then he followed them with his swift, light step, and pausing upon the threshold, looked into the open room, his gaze first seeking Ruth. She stood on the other side of the chamber, apart from the group around the bed. But she did not see him; her eyes and hands and thoughts were on the bandages which she was hastily preparing. He shrank from what she was doing and turning hastily away fixed his eyes on the attorney-general. Thus, silently looking and listening, he presently heard him say how deeply he regretted being compelled to leave the country before knowing the result of his friend's wound, adding that he was leaving on the next day for Tippecanoe. Philip Alston barely glanced at the white face lying against the pillow. He was disturbed and even shocked to see it there. He felt this stranger's presence in her chamber to be a desecration. And then the sight of suffering always made him uncomfortable. He wondered how she could endure it. The repulsion which the average man feels for any affliction of mind, body, or estate was so intensified in him that he could not, with all his intelligence, understand that the very sight of great suffering nobly borne, does much to win a woman's heart.