A stealthy step behind her, two throttling hands at her throat smothering her startled cry. She was thrown violently down, the jewels wrenched from her hands and ears, the purse from her dress; then the black-hearted murderer fled toward the waiting train, leaving his victim for dead upon the ground. CHAPTER X. AT DEAD OF NIGHT. I gaze on her frozen face, Her mystical, sightless eyes. And now--even now--her grace The power of death defies. W. J. BENNERS, JR. Kathleen lay still and white under the starless sky, like one dead, and there was no one to come to her rescue, for the telegraph operator, busy at his instrument, dreamed not of her proximity, and at this hour of the night there were no loiterers about in the village. Swiftly and silently had the fiend escaped, and it was most probable that day would dawn ere any one would discover the beautiful girl lying out there in the rear of the depot upon the damp, muddy ground, dead and cold. But to return to Boston, which our heroine had so unceremoniously quitted. Her last thought as the train steamed away with her was of Ralph Chainey, the handsome actor, who had looked so tenderly into her eyes, and who had whispered as he held her hand at parting: "I hope we shall meet again." Her tears had started at the memory. "It is all over," she sighed. "He will be gone away from Boston before I go back, and I shall never see him again." But at that very moment events were shaping themselves in Ralph Chainey's life so as to bring him to her side again. In his room at the Thorndike Hotel he was reading a telegram that said: "Come at once. Fedora is ill--perhaps dying." His handsome face grew grave and troubled. Throwing down the telegram, he sought his manager. "Every engagement for this week must be canceled. I must go South on the first train." "But, my dear Mr. Chainey, the loss will amount to thousands of dollars," expostulated the reluctant manager. "No matter; let the loss be mine. A--some one--is--ill--dying. I must go." "I am very sorry. We were having a splendid success here," sighed the manager; but his regrets did not deter the young man from going. Two hours after Kathleen had left Boston, he drove up to the same station where she had taken the train for the South, and entered another one going in the same direction. Meanwhile, Susette sauntered back to Beacon Street with the message Kathleen had dictated--she would be at home later on. Mrs. Carew was indignant. She had been planning to take Kathleen away by the noon train. Her trunk, already strapped and corded, stood in the hall. Susette received a severe scolding for leaving her young mistress, but she did not seem much affected by it. "She is my mistress, and I should not dare to disobey her orders," she replied, and walked out of the room. "What shall you do now?" asked Alpine, curiously. "I must wait and take her on a later train."