The only difficulty attendant on this undertaking seemed to consist in wresting her from the protection of her friends; for though courts of law no longer afforded relief to injured loyalists, a police was still preserved, and the precincts of a college could not be violated with impunity, or indeed with a prospect of success. He resorted, therefore, to stratagem, invented a tale of distress, and disguised a female accomplice to pass as the widow of a soldier who had fallen at Naseby. A story of sick children perishing for want was likely to operate on the feelings of humane young women. Constantia and Isabel were soon drawn beyond the walls of Oxford, and conducted along the banks of the Charwell, in search of this scene of misery. When they were at such a distance from the city as to preclude the chance of assistance, several men, masked and disguised, rushed out of an inclosure, seized their fainting prey, and bore her from her shrieking companion to a carriage which waited to receive her. The horses set off at full speed, and Isabel, in an agony of despair, ran after it till it was out of sight, invoking the interposition of Heaven, and casting many a vain look around to see if any human succour was at hand. Tired and exhausted, she at last recollected, that to return to the city and relate the event, describing to the municipal officers the road the fugitives had taken, would afford the most probable means of rescue; and, though it would be unspeakable agony to meet her bereaved uncle and aunt, she yet considered that her being with them would afford them some consolation, beside the advantage of her testimony for the recovery of her dear companion. When Constantia revived from the state of insensibility into which the suddenness of the assault had hurried her weak spirits, she found herself in a chaise with Monthault, who watched the return of her senses to pour out some passionate encomiums on her beauty, and protestations of his insurmountable, though hopeless love. "I will speak this once," said she, "and then for ever be silent. Hear, abandoned man and perfidious friend! I would sooner die than yield to your wishes; and I know my father would weep less over my corpse, than if he saw me contaminated by your embraces. Restore me to him; nay, only give me liberty to fly back to his dear arms, and I will never disclose that you were the ravisher; but if you persist in your cruelty, it will be of no other avail than to plunge your soul in additional guilt."