Page:Lady Barbarity; a romance (IA ladybarbarityrom00snai).pdf/98

 reached the kitchen part. Soon I found an outer door, unlocked it, slipped the bolt, and stepped into the night. The slight, soft breathing of a frost wind came upon my face, and a few straggling white flakes rode at intervals upon it, but only a film of snow was on the yard, of no more consistency than thistledown, but the sharp air was wonderfully keen.

However, 'twas precious little heed I paid the elements. The shoutings of the soldiers from the meadows was even distincter than before, and by that I knew the men were moving in the direction of the rebel and the house, and that if I hoped to put the lad in some safety not an instant must be lost. First, though, I had to find him.

I peered particularly on all sides for the fugitive, but failed to discover a solitary trace, and yet there was such a lustre in the hour's bright conditions that the yard was nearly as luminous as day. Sure I was, however, that he must be close at hand, and accordingly was mighty energetic in my quest. And I had taken twenty steps or less when my eyes lit on a stable with an open door. Immediately I walked towards it, and as I did so, remembered that this was the very prison in which the lad had been previously held. This time there was not a bayonet and a sentry to repulse one, else a strategy had been called for; but, walking boldly in, I was rewarded for my labours. The prisoner was lying in the straw in the very posture of the night before. No sooner was my shadow thrown across his