"Yes," said Farmer Meredith, "there's wonderful news for you. The horse-thief, Gerald Huntington, attempted to escape night before last. He knocked down two keepers, and got almost a mile away before he was caught and taken back. They say he fought like a lion for his freedom." Jaquelina started and grew deadly pale at his words. "I have brought the newspaper with me," went on the farmer. "It's all written there. Stop clattering the dishes a minute, Lina, and I'll read it out for you." His niece stood still with her hand resting on the table, and listened while he turned the paper and read out, slowly: "Attempted escape of Gerald Huntington, the chief of the outlaw gang that had infested the mountains so long, and who was so summarily captured little more than a year ago by a brave young girl." Having read this much, which was printed in flaring head lines and capitals, Mr. Meredith cleared his throat, and proceeded to attack the smaller type: "It is well known to the most of our readers that the long-pending case against Gerald Huntington was decided in the court on Monday by a sentence of ten years' confinement in the penitentiary. The prisoner was remanded to the county jail to remain until Friday, when he was to be removed to the penitentiary. Tuesday evening, at dusk, he was visited in his cell by a veiled lady who remained with him half an hour engaged in deep and private conversation. It is supposed that this mysterious stranger conveyed to him a club which was skillfully concealed beneath her voluminous draperies. At nightfall the prisoner, armed with this enormous and heavy implement, assaulted the keeper who brought him his supper, and succeeded in escaping into the hall, where he knocked down the door-keeper and made a desperate run for liberty. He was pursued by several persons, who captured and bound him after a terrible struggle. He is now heavily ironed and chained down to the floor of his cell. Public curiosity is highly excited over the mysterious veiled visitant who furnished him the club, but the prisoner preserves a dogged and obstinate silence regarding her, and nothing is known of her in the town." "Oh, poor fellow!" cried Jaquelina, quite involuntarily, as he paused. "Chained to the floor of his cell! How dreadful!" "You are not sorry for the wretch--are you, Lina?" said her uncle, looking at her in surprise. "Yes--very sorry," she said, shuddering at the thought of the gloomy prison cell, and the clanking chains that held Gerald Huntington down from the free, wild woodland life he loved.