It
was literally a gallop. Through the chariot windows I saw Tom stand as he
drove, and every now and then throw an awful glance over his shoulder. Were
we pursued? Never was agony of prayer like mine, as with clasped hands and
wild stare I gazed through the windows on the road, whose trees and hedges
and gabled cottages were chasing one another backward at so giddy a speed.
We were now ascending that identical steep, with the giant ash-trees at the
right and the stile between, which my vision of Meg Hawkes had presented
all that night, when my excited eye detected a running figure within the
hedge. I saw the head of some one crossing the stile in pursuit, and I
heard Brice's name shrieked.
'Drive on--on--on!' I screamed.
But Brice pulled up. I was on my knees on the floor of the carriage, with
clasped hands, expecting capture, when the door opened, and Meg Hawkes,
pale as death, her cloak drawn over her black tresses, looked in.
'Oh!--ho!--ho!--thank God!' she screamed. 'Shake hands, lass. Tom, yer a
good un! He's a good lad, Tom.'
'Come in, Meg--you must sit by me,' I said, recovering all at once.
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