wo alone in the world.

"We must be at least twenty miles from Richmond," said the girl.

"I haven't measured the time," Prescott replied, "but it's an easy
progress. I am quite sure that if we keep on going long enough we'll
arrive somewhere at last."

"I think it likely," she said, smiling. "I wonder that we don't see any
houses."

"Virginia isn't the most densely peopled country in the world, and we
are coming to a pretty sterile region that won't support much life in
the best of times."

"Are we on doubtful ground?"

"That or very near it."

They passed at least one or two houses by the roadside, but they were
lone and dark. No lean Virginia dogs howled at them and the solitary
and desolate character of the country did not abate.

"Are you cold?" asked Prescott.

"Not at all," she replied. "I have never in my life taken an easier
journey. It seems that fortune has been with us."

"Fortune favours the good or ought to do so."

"How long do you think it is until daylight?"

"I don't know; an hour, I suppose; why bother about it?"

Certainly Prescott was not troubling his head by trying to determine the
exact distance to daylight, but he began to think for the first time of
his journey's end. He must leave Miss Catherwood somewhere in
comparative safety, and he must get back to Richmond, his absence
unnoted. These were problems which might well become vexing, and the
exaltation of the moment could not prevent their recurrence. He stopped
the wagon and took a look at the worthy Elias, who was slumbering as
peacefully as ever. "A sound conscience makes a sound sleeper," he
quoted, and then he inspected the country.

It was a little wilderness of hills and scrub forest, all lying under
the deep snow, and without sign of either human or animal life.

"There is nothing to do but drive on," he said. "If I only dared to wake
our friend, the farmer, we might find out from him which way the nearest
Northern pickets lie."

"You should let me go now, Captain Prescott, I beg you again."

"Abandon you in this snowy waste! I claim to be an American gentleman,
Miss Catherwood. But if we don't strike a promising lead soon I shall
waken our friend Elias, and he will have to point a way, whether he will
or no."

But that threat was saved as a last resort, and he drove quietly around
the curve of a hill. When they reached the other side, there was the
rapid crunch of hoofs in the snow, an abrupt command to halt, an