Page:Clermont - Roche (1798, volume 1).djvu/29

 touch the ground, she left the castle, and reached the valley by a different path from that which the stranger had taken. She had scarcely quitted it, when a sudden rustling among the trees behind her induced her to look back, and she perceived him slowly emerging from the midst of them. The speed of Madeline was now if possible increased, and, faint and breathless, she gained the enclosure before her father's cottage. As she fastened the little gate, she paused and leaned over it, but almost instantly retreated from it to the house, discovering the stranger to be within a few yards of it.

Her father was not yet returned; and the maid, busied in preparing the supper table, took no notice of her agitation. The idea of security soon restored Madeline's composure; she then resolved not to acquaint her father with the incident that had alarmed her, least it should agitate, and render him uneasy, if at any future time chance prevented her returning home as soon as he