The hammock rested motionless. The captain leaped out of it, and said to the young girl: "Quick, we have not a moment to lose! Dear Dolores, get into this hammock at once and do not be afraid." "You will kill me first, villain!" cried the mother superior, throwing herself upon the young girl, whom she held within her arms, at the same time crying out, "Help! help!" At this moment lights could be seen coming and going at a distance from the bottom of the garden. "Here comes somebody at last!" screamed Sister Prudence, redoubling her cries of "Help! help!" "Madame," said the captain, "let loose Dolores immediately!" And he forcibly withdrew the young girl from the obstinate embrace, holding Sister Prudence until Dolores could spring into the hammock. Seeing her safely seated there, the captain called: "Ho there! Hoist." And the hammock rose rapidly, so light was the weight of the young girl. [Illustration: "_'You shall not escape me.'_" Original etching by Adrian Marcel.] Sister Prudence, thoroughly enraged, and thinking that help would come perhaps too late, for the lights were still distant, screamed louder than ever, and threw herself on the hammock, to hold it down; but the captain drew her arm familiarly within his own, and, in spite of her struggles, held her like a vice. "Dolores," said the captain, "do not be afraid, my love. When you reach the large branches, yield yourself without fear to the motion which will draw the hammock outside the wall. Sans-Plume is on the other side, and he is watching everything. Tell him, as soon as you reach the earth, to throw me the knotted rope, and hold it well on the outside." "Yes, my Horatio," said Dolores, who was already eight or ten feet above the earth; "be calm, our love doubles my courage." And the young mocker, leaning out of the hammock, said, with a laugh; "Good evening, Sister Prudence, good evening!" "You will be damned, accursed creature," said the mother superior. "But you, you wretch! you shall not escape me," added she, holding on with desperate and convulsive anger to the captain's arm. "They are coming, and you will be taken." In fact, the lights were becoming more and more visible, and the captain could distinctly hear the voices of persons calling: "Sister Prudence! Sister Prudence!" The arrival of this aid increased the strength of the mother superior, who still clinched the arm of Horace. She was beginning to embarrass the sailor quite seriously; he could not resort to violence to escape this aged woman. In the meanwhile, the lights and the voices came nearer and nearer, and Sans-Plume, occupied, no doubt, in assuring the safe descent of Dolores on the other side of the wall, had not yet thrown the rope, his only means of flight. Then wishing, at any cost, to extricate himself from the grasp of the sister, the captain said to her: "I pray you, madame, release me." "Never, villain. Help, help!"