te venture, she was afraid of her grandmother, she
was afraid of Ben Fisher, she was afraid even of the man she was trying
to save, but most of all she was afraid of being too late, and so the
poor child went on, her heart full of one passionate, unspoken prayer,
that she might be in time to save him. It was little wonder then that
she never turned her head, never heard the footsteps so close behind
her. She reached the brink of the creek at length and peered into
its depths, then turned and skirted along the top of the bank, Fisher
following closely in her track.

They had gone but a little way when he saw, greatly to his astonishment,
that the bank, instead of being a steep drop of about twenty feet,
gently sloped like it did near the hut, and a track, half hidden by
thick scrub, ran down the slope. Down this track the girl went swiftly,
her skirts raising a little whirl of dust behind her. The man paused a
moment, and by the light of the moon examined his pistols to see they
were loaded, for he judged he was doing an unwise thing. Should there
be men there, as he more than half suspected, there was no knowing what
might happen; but still he never thought of turning back, that Nellie
was there was more than sufficient reason he should follow. When he
looked again he was startled to find she had vanished, and the measured
sound of a horse's hoof-beats broke on his ear. At the same moment he
saw the path took a turn in the scrub, and drawing out a pistol, ran
down it. As he turned the corner, he came full on Nellie standing
motionless in the moon-light; the covering had fallen from her head, and
she was stretching out her arms to a mounted figure which was draped,
horse and all, in a long white cloth which fell almost to the ground.

It flashed across the overseer that this was the "Trotting Cob," this
was the ghost he had been warned against, and a very substantial,
life-like ghost it was too. He wondered as he stood there that any man
could be deceived.

The girl stood right in its path, right between the two men, and to
move, the horseman must either ride over her or turn into the scrub.

He seemed inclined to do neither, but with an angry oath flung back the
covering from his face.

"You, girl!" he said.

Then she burst out, half-sobbing, "Oh, Jim, Jim! I was afraid I 'd be
too late. Oh, Jim, Gran wouldn't let--"

"Too late!" said the man; he spoke apparently with an effort, but in
such grave, cultured tones