la. "However, she can shelter herself there for
the night, though it will be very cold without a fire."

"Some one ought to build one to keep her warm," Olive returned, with a
significance that was not lost on her keen-witted cousin.

CHAPTER XXX.

A TERRIBLE DEED.

John Franklin's manly blood had boiled with resentment at seeing poor
Dainty driven away in disgrace from the home of which she was virtually
the mistress, for he believed every word of the story she had told Mrs.
Ellsworth.

It made his kind heart ache to realize so fully the sad mental plight of
his young master, who could sit by in apathy, and suffer such a cruel
wrong to be done to his unfortunate young wife.

He gloried in the pride that had made her fling back in the woman's face
the offered pittance from her cruel persecutor.

"Yet, poor soul, she looked shabby and penniless. Perhaps she had not
the money to pay her fare to Richmond. I wonder if the unfortunate young
lady would accept a loan from her husband's servant?" he thought,
anxiously.

It pained him to think of her going out into the darkness of the night,
friendless and shelterless, knowing how well his master had loved her,
and how worthy she was of that love.

He decided that it was his duty to follow her and proffer his services
if she needed them, though in so clandestine a manner that wicked Mrs.
Ellsworth need not find it out and revenge herself by cruelty to his
master.

Leaving Love presently to the care of another attendant, he slipped away
through the grounds to the road, wondering which way the unhappy
wanderer had gone.

A little incident ended his perplexity.

While pausing under the shade of a tree, gazing anxiously up and down
the road, he suddenly saw the cousins Olive and Ela, skulking like
criminals out in the dusky woodland path that led to old mammy's cabin;
and the light of the rising moon on their faces showed them pallid and
scared-looking, as if pursued by threatening fiends. Clasping each
other's hands, and panting with excitement, they fled across the road to
the gates of Ellsworth, without perceiving that they were detected in
something underhand by the lynx eyes of a suspicious watcher.

"They have been up to some mischief, and I will find it out if I can,"
he thought, darting into the woodland path, and following it with alert
eyes until suddenly the darkness was illuminated by the glare of fire,
and rushing forward, he discovered old mamm