Fortune's My Foe

rriage which Symson was now conducting, or rather the third that morning, since already a

y, quick! or there will be no ceremony," while, from without, and from the neighbourhood of the porch, there came cries and jeers--these being from some idlers who ha

Beau to the real Ariadne Thorne, the other had become almost beside himself--had, indeed, exhibited so awful a picture of a man t

the dress sword he carried by his side from out its sheath, and would have made a pass at the other--indeed, did half do so. But, swift as lightning, that pass was thwarted--by two people! By his newly made wife, who seized his arm even as he would have plunged the bl

work with murder? To end your days at Tyburn?" Then, turning to one of the friends o

ttle and Anne, and half-delirious with rage, Bufton was borne away. Yet not before he had shrieked such awful objurgations, such curses and blasphemies on the head

let us begone, too. Come, Ar

stood close by her mother's side--and bade t

your own head. Your revenge for your sister's wrongs has been terrible, nay, supreme; but at wh

ther! you remember--I swore that if ever the chance came, I would avenge her. Ah! Sir Geoffrey, Sir Geoffrey, if you ha

, "knowing all, as I do now, from Miss Thorne

her there was no call. Oh! why, why, should that monster have had two of my daughters for his victims

she want for aught. You know that, and you, too, Anne. Now, le

occasion, her pride had stepped in. "For," she had whispered to herself, again and again, "if he loves me, as he has said so oft, then surely he cannot doubt. He was enraged at the time, deeming, in truth, that that vile fop and knave could have come in search of none but me. But, surely, reflection must convince him it was not so. Surely--surely." And

d told him all, with the res

ing heart for that coming, "I should not have been sent for, only it was thought I might be off and away to t

that news hastened the despatch of my message," and she looked fondly at him. "Yo

n he has seen him.'" Then, he added, "But, still, after what we have witnesse

d drove to her death; loved her fondly. I remember after it had happened last year, when the poor child drowned herself after he cast her off, that Anne was

, with unconscious humou

ere to obtain the hand of Miss Thorne, the heiress, if possible--the man not knowing that she was in attendance on me--and that decide

waiting at Vauxhall and Ranelagh for Anne,

d, another time as a Turkish dancing girl, and, as often as not, as a shepherdess with white wig and patches. And he persu

m. Yet, I vow, he at least deserves to suffer from i

e had not told even now. It appeared that she had not divulged all of the plot. For Ari

g Lord John Dallas--he who arrived at the end of the

and wronged almost as much as he wronged and

e! who

s creature, his hireling. He who stood b

at the other should do this thing? Forgive me, Ariadne, I would not say aught to woun

ppened, and doubly terrified at what will, I fear, happen yet. Oh! why, why, did I let it continue? Yet Geoffrey, upon my honour

r wh

terrible scene, and when she was upstairs with me--laughs and says that, if she is truly tied to him by t

to him, then? Surely he had no siste

ave met before, that he helped her to plan this scheme, I feel a

. And, though I say it not unkind

happiness in store for us. I never heard that they had met at Tunbridge, and that he was deceived into thinking she was Ariadne Thorne. I never knew, un

acci

s easy enough to distinguish in the glow of the sunset--a scarlet coat in the avenue

one I thought you had worn, and

ld be who was wearing that scarlet coat, and then she told me all, or, at least, almost all. But, knowing you were comin

s that you had no part in the plot. Knave, vagabond as the fellow is,

tanding by his words, that

thousand pities it was that a brave girl such as Anne Pottle should have ruined her future to obtain revenge; she, of what

ttle closer to her lover's arm even as she did so, "two persons whom,

re is no truth in the report that I take my ship to join Boscawen; since, too, it seems likely that she and I are doomed to inaction. Ah! if

ely, she thought, he must know how much she, too, desired that; and still, as t

aw his face to-day, saw the look, the hideous look of rage and spite

a broken, bankrupt knave, and I am a king's officer; whi