“Oh! don’t you mind it, miss. I don’t think they’re after the young one. They’re after the two elder ones, and if he gives it away so they ever get them they’ll be easy on him.” Ruth uttered an exclamation of disgust. “He’ll never give it away——” She checked herself. “Don’t know—a man’ll do a heap to save his own neck.” He made a gesture, drawing his hand across his throat significantly. “I know that young man, and I say he’ll die before he’d betray anyone—much less his cousin and brother.” “Well, maybe so.” Just as the messenger turned away Ruth caught sight of someone standing in the shrubbery, and as the man went out of the gate the person came forward. It was Virgy Still. She appeared to be in a state of great agitation, and began to tell Ruth a story in which her father and Rupert Gray and Major Leech were all mixed up so incoherently that, but that Ruth had just heard the facts, she could never have been able to unravel it. At length Ruth was able to calm her and to get her account. She had sent a man over to tell Ruth, but she was so afraid he had not come that she had followed him. “They want to get rid of Mr. Rupert. It has something to do with the case against pa and your father. They are afraid Mr. Rupert will give evidence against them, and they mean to put him in jail and keep him from doing it. Do you know what it is?” Ruth shook her head. “I do not either. I heard them talking about it, but I did not understand what it was. They ain’t after Mr. Rupert; they’re after Mr. Jacquelin and Captain Allen.” She suddenly burst into tears. “Oh, Miss Ruth,” she sobbed, “you don’t know—you don’t know——” “I don’t know what?” asked Ruth, gently. “He is the only one that was always kind to me.” “Who?” “Mr. Jacquelin. He was always good to me; when I was a little bit of girl he was always kind to me. And now he hates me, and I never wanted the place!” “Oh, I don’t think he does,” said Ruth, consolingly. “Yes, he does; I know he does,” sobbed the girl. “And I never wanted the place. I have been miserable ever since I went there.” Ruth looked at her with new sympathy. The idea that the poor girl was in love with Jacquelin had never crossed her mind. She felt an unspeakable pity for her. “And now they want me to marry Mr. Leech,” moaned the girl, “and I hate him—I hate him! Oh, I wish we never had had the place. I know he would not want to marry me if pa did not have it, and could not help him get the governorship. And I hate him. I hope we’ll lose the case.” “I would not marry anyone I did not want to marry,” said Ruth. “Oh, you don’t know,” said Virgy. “You don’t know Wash. And pa wants me to marry him too; he says he’ll be Governor. Pa loves me, but he won’t hear to my not marrying. And I’ll have to do it—unless we lose the case,” she added. She rose and went away, leaving Ruth with a new idea in her mind.