"Frogwater," said young Lord Dogwood, with a generous flush, "I was wrong. Wynchgate, your hand."
The two noblemen shook hands.
"My friends," said Lord Wynchgate, "in asking you to abandon our game, I had an end in view. I ask your help in an affair of the heart."
"Ha! excellent!" exclaimed the five noblemen. "We are with you heart and soul."
"I propose this night," continued Wynchgate, "with your help, to carry off a young girl, a female!"
"An abduction!" exclaimed the Ambassador somewhat sternly. "Wynchgate, I cannot countenance this."
"Mistake me not," said the Earl, "I intend to abduct her. But I propose nothing dishonourable. It is my firm resolve to offer her marriage."
"Then," said Lord Frogwater, "I am with you."
"Gentlemen," concluded Wynchgate, "all is ready. The coach is below. I have provided masks, pistols, and black cloaks. Follow me."
A few moments later, a coach, with the blinds drawn, in which were six noblemen armed to the teeth, might have been seen, were it not for the darkness, approaching the humble lodging in which Winnifred Clair was sheltered.
But what it did when it got there, we must leave to another chapter.
CHAPTER V
THE ABDUCTION
The hour was twenty minutes to ten on the evening described in our last chapter.
Winnifred Clair was seated, still fully dressed, at the window of the bedroom, looking out over the great city.
A light tap came at the door.
"If it's a fried egg," called Winnifred softly, "I do not need it. I ate yesterday."
"No," said the voice of the Landlady. "You are wanted below."
"I!" exclaimed Winnifred, "below!"
"You," said the Landlady, "below. A party of gentlemen have called for you."
"Gentlemen," exclaimed Winnifred, putting her hand to her brow in perplexity, "for me! at this late hour! Here! This evening! In this house?"
"Yes," repeated the Landlady, "six gentlemen. They arrived in a closed coach. They are all closely masked and heavily armed. They beg you will descend at once."
"Just Heaven!" cried the Unhappy Girl. "Is it possible that they mean to abduct me?"
"They do," said the Landlady. "They said so!"
"Alas!" cried Winnifred, "I am powerless. Tell them"—she hesitated—"tell them I will be down immediately. Let them not come up. Keep them below on any pretext. Show them an album. Let them look at the goldfish. Anything, but not here! I shall be ready in a moment."
Feverishly she made herself ready. As hastily as possible she removed all traces of tears from her face. She threw about her shoulders an opera cloak, and with a light Venetian scarf half concealed the beauty of her hair and features. "Abducted!" she murmured, "and by six of them! I think she said six. Oh, the horror of it!" A touch of powder to her cheeks and a slight blackening of her eyebrows, and the courageous girl was ready.
Lord Wynchgate and his companions—for they it was, that is to say, they were it—sat below in the sitting-room looking at the albums. "Woman," said Lord Wynchgate to the Landlady, with an oath, "let her hurry up. We have seen enough of these. We can wait no longer."
"I am here," cried a clear voice upon the threshold, and Winnifred stood before them. "My lords, for I divine who you are and wherefore you have come, take me, do your worst with me, but spare, oh, spare this humble companion of my sorrow."
"Right-oh!" said Lord Dogwood, with a brutal laugh.
"Enough," exclaimed Wynchgate, and seizing Winnifred by the waist, he dragged her forth out of the house and out upon the street.
But something in the brutal violence of his behaviour seemed to kindle for the moment a spark of manly feeling, if such there were, in the breasts of his companions.
"Wynchgate," cried young Lord Dogwood, "my mind misgives me. I doubt if this is a gentlemanly thing to do. I'll have no further hand in it."
A chorus of approval from his companions endorsed his utterance. For a moment they hesitated.
"Nay," cried Winnifred, turning to confront the masked faces that stood about her, "go forward with your fell design. I am here. I am helpless. Let no prayers stay your hand. Go to it."
"Have done with this!" cried Wynchgate, with a brutal oath. "Shove her in the coach."
But at the very moment the sound of hurrying footsteps was heard, and a clear, ringing, manly, well-toned, vibrating voice cried, "Hold! Stop! Desist! Have a care, titled villain, or I will strike you to the earth."
A tall aristocratic form bounded out of the darkness.
"Gentlemen," cried Wynchgate, releasing his hold upon the frightened girl, "we are betrayed. Save yourselves. To the coach."
In another instant the six noblemen had leaped into the coach and disappeared down the street.
Winnifred, still half inanimate with fright, turned to her rescuer, and saw before her the form and lineaments of the Unknown Stranger, who had thus twice stood between her and disaster. Half fainting, she fell swooning into his arms.
"Dear lady," he exclaimed, "rouse yourself. You are safe. Let me restore you to your home!"
"That voice!" cried Winnifred, resuming consciousness. "It is my benefactor."
She would have swooned again, but the Unknown lifted her bodily up the steps of her home and leant her against the door.
"Farewell," he said, in a voice resonant with gloom.
"Oh, sir!" cried the unhappy girl, "let one who owes so much to one who has saved her in her hour of need at least know his name."
But the stranger, with a mournful gesture of farewell, had disappeared as rapidly as he had come.
But, as to why he had disappeared, we must ask our reader's patience for another chapter.
CHAPTER VI
THE UNKNOWN
The scene is now shifted, sideways and forwards, so as to put it at Muddlenut Chase, and to make it a fortnight later than the events related in the last chapter.
Winnifred is now at the Chase as the guest of the Marquis and Marchioness. There her bruised soul finds peace.
The Chase itself was one of those typical country homes which are, or were till yesterday, the glory of England. The approach to the Chase lay through twenty miles of glorious forest, filled with fallow deer and wild bulls. The house itself, dating from the time of the Plantagenets, was surrounded by a moat covered with broad lilies and floating green scum. Magnificent peacocks sunned themselves on the terraces, while from the surrounding shrubberies there rose the soft murmur of doves, pigeons, bats, owls and partridges.
Here sat Winnifred Clair day after day upon the terrace recovering her strength, under the tender solicitude of the Marchioness.
Each day the girl urged upon her noble hostess the necessity of her departure. "Nay," said the Marchioness, with gentle insistence, "stay where you are. Your soul is bruised. You must rest."
"Alas," cried Winnifred, "who am I that I should rest? Alone, despised, buffeted by fate, what right have I to your kindness?"
"Miss Clair," replied the noble lady, "wait till you are stronger. There is something that I wish to say to you."
Then at last, one morning when Winnifred's temperature had fallen to ninety-eight point three, the Marchioness spoke.
"Miss Clair," she said, in a voice which throbbed with emotion, "Winnifred, if I may so call you, Lord Muddlenut and I have formed a plan for your future. It is our dearest wish that you should marry our son."
"Alas," cried Winnifred, while tears rose in her eyes, "it cannot be!"
"Say not so," cried the Marchioness. "Our son, Lord Mordaunt Muddlenut, is young, handsome, all that a girl could desire. After months of wandering he returns to us this morning. It is our dearest wish to see him married and established. We offer you his hand."
"Indeed," replied Winnifred, while her tears fell even more freely, "I seem to requite but ill the kindness that you show. Alas, my heart is no longer in my keeping."
"Where is it?" cried the Marchioness.