"Oh, they are," said Hugh Ingelow, confidently, "if you administered the drug and they drank the tea." "I did," said Mrs. Sharpe, "and they drank the tea and went to bed awful sleepy. If you think it's safe, I'll go down." "All right. Come along." Mrs. Sharpe lowered the sash and hurried down stairs. Bolts clattered, the lock creaked, but the sleepers in the house made no sign. A second or two and the nocturnal marauders were together in the hall. "I told you it was safe," said Mr. Ingelow. "You are a woman in a thousand, Sarah, to manage so cleverly! Now, then, for Miss Dane! Upstairs, is it? Do you go in first, Sarah; but don't tell her I'm coming. I want the pleasure of surprising her myself." Sarah smiled, and unlocked Mollie's door. The girl was sitting with an anxious, listening, expectant face. She rose up and turned around at the opening of the door. "Is it you, nurse? Oh, I have been so uneasy! What noise was--" She never finished the sentence--it died out in an inarticulate cry of joy. For Hugh Ingelow, his disguise torn off, stood in the door-way, smiling and serene as the god of safety himself. Mollie Dane was a creature of impulse--she never stopped to think. One faint; suppressed cry, one bound forward, and she was in the young man's arms. "Hugh! Hugh! Hugh!" she cried, hysterically, clinging to him, "save me! save me!" It was the first time she had ever called him other than Mr. Ingelow. The young man's arms closed around her as if they never would open again. "My darling, I have come to save you!" It had all passed in five seconds, but that short interval was long enough for Mollie's womanly instincts to take the alarm. She disengaged herself, reddening violently. What would he think of her? and Mrs. Sharpe there, too! "They have driven me nearly out of my senses!" she said, with a sort of choking sob. "I don't know what I am doing half the time, and I was so glad to see a friend's familiar face, Mr. Ingelow." The blue eyes--the eyes of a very child--lifted themselves wistfully, deprecatingly, shining in tears. Hugh Ingelow was touched to the core of his heart. "I know it, my poor little girl! It is enough to drive any one out of his senses. But let us see if we can't outwit the crafty Oleander. Put your bonnet on and come." Mollie paused suddenly, and looked first at him, then at Mrs. Susan Sharpe, then back again. "Well, Miss Dane," said Mr. Ingelow, "you're not afraid to come with me?" "Afraid?" the blue eyes turned upon him with an eloquent glance. "Oh, no! But she--Mrs. Sharpe--" "Is coming, too, of course, to play propriety," laughed Hugh. "Mrs. Sharpe," turning to that demure lady, "put on your fixings and let us fly!" Mrs. Sharpe nodded, and turned to go into her own room. "There's Miss Dane's things," she said, pointing to the pegs on which they hung. "I'll be back in two minutes." Mr. Ingelow took them down, and tenderly wrapped the long mantle about the slender, girlish figure.