"Why wasn't I? Because I couldn't be in half a dozen places at once," answered her cousin, rather crossly. "I've been badgered within an inch of my life by confounded women in shabby dresses and poky bonnets all day. Out of two or three bushels of chaff I only found one grain of wheat." "And that one?" "Her earthly name is Susan Sharpe, and she rejoices in red hair and green glasses, and the blood and brawn and muscle of a gladiator--a treasure who doesn't object to a howling wilderness or a raving-mad patient. I clinched her at once." "And she goes with you--when?" "To-morrow morning. If Mollie's still obdurate, I must leave her in this woman's charge, and return to town. As soon as I can settle my affairs, I will go back to the farm and be off with my bride to Havana." "Always supposing she will not consent to return with you to New York in that character?" "Of course. But she never will do that," the doctor said, despondently. "You don't know how she hates me, Blanche." Blanche shrugged her graceful shoulders. "Do you implicitly trust this woman you have hired?" "I trust no one," responded Dr. Guy, brusquely. "My mother and Sally and Peter will watch her. Although, I dare say, there may be no necessity, it is always best to be on the safe side." "How I should like to see her--to triumph over her--to exult in her misery!" Blanche cried, her eyes sparkling. "I dare say," said Dr. Oleander, with sneering cynicism. "You would not be a woman, else. But you will never have the chance. I don't hate my poor little captive, remember. There! is that the dinner-bell?" "Yes--come! We have Sir Roger Trajenna to-day, and Mr. Walraven detests being kept waiting." "Poor Sir Roger!" with a sneering laugh. "How does the lovesick old dotard bear this second loss?" "Better than he did the first; his pride aids him. It is my husband who is like a man distraught." "The voice of Nature speaks loudly in the paternal-breast," said Dr. Oleander. "'Nater will caper,' as Ethan Spike says. Mollie's mamma must have been a very pretty woman, Blanche." Mrs. Walraven's black eyes snapped; but they were at the dining-room door, and she swept in as your tall, stately women in trailing silks do sweep, bowing to the baronet, and taking her place, and, of course, the subject of the interesting captive down in Long Island was postponed indefinitely. Dr. Oleander dined and spent the evening at the Walraven palace, and talked about his ward's second flight with her distressed guardian, and opined she must have gone off to gratify some whim of her own, and laughed in his sleeve at the two anxious faces before him, and departed at ten, mellow with wine and full of hope for the future.