e said. "Nobody but Larry wants me now."

Miss Schuyler saw that she was determined, and drew aside. "Then," she
said, with a little quiver in her voice, "because I think he is in peril
you must go, my dear. But we must be very careful, and I am coming with
you as far as I dare."

She closed the door, and then her composure seemed to fail her as they
went out into the corridor; and it was Hetty who, treading very softly,
took the lead. Flitting like shadows, they reached the head of the
stairway, and stopped a moment there, Hetty's heart beating furiously. The
passage beneath them was shadowy, but a blaze of light and a jingle of
glasses came out of the half-opened door of the hall, where Torrance sat
with his guests; and while they waited, they heard his voice and
recognized the vindictive ring in it. Hetty trembled as she grasped the
bannister.

"Flo," she said, "they may come out in a minute. We have got to slip by
somehow."

They went down the stairway with skirts drawn close about them, in swift
silence, and Hetty held her breath as she flitted past the door. There was
a faint swish of draperies as Flora Schuyler followed her, but the murmur
of voices drowned it; and in another minute Hetty had opened a door at the
back of the building. Then, she gasped with relief as she felt the cold
wind on her face, and, with Miss Schuyler close behind her, crept through
the shadow of the house towards the bluff. When the gloom of the trees
closed about them, she clutched her companion's shoulder.

"No," she said hoarsely, "not that way. Joe is watching there. We must go
right through the bluff and down the opposite side of it."

They floundered forward, sinking ankle-deep in withered leaves and clammy
mould, tripping over rotting branches that ripped their dresses, and
stumbling into dripping undergrowth. There was no moon now, and it was
very dark, and more than once Flora Schuyler valiantly suppressed the
scream that would have been a vast relief to her, and struggled on as
silently as she could behind her companion; but it seemed to her that
anybody a mile away could have heard them. Then, a little trail led them
out of the bluff on the opposite side to the house, and the roar of the
river grew louder as they hastened on, still in the gloom of the trees,
until something a little blacker than the shadows behind it grew into
visibility; and when it moved a little, Flora Schuyler touched Hetty's
arm.

"Yes," she said.