_ CHAPTER XXV. SAVED!
Professor Ruggles had not been remiss in his judgment. It was Madge Scarlet who stole his victim from his arms almost in the hour of his devilish triumph. She did not get on the train from the little way station, however. She was on the train when it drew out of the great city by the lake, but the scheming Ruggles knew it not.
She, too, wore a veil, and was otherwise disguised, and managed not to show herself to the man she had once called friend. Immediately on her release from jail she began to watch Ruggles, who kept himself out of the way, or walked the streets only in disguise.
She haunted the depots of the city, and was lucky enough to see him when he took passage. Quietly boarding the same train, she bided her time, intent on gaining possession of the detective's sister for purposes of her own.
The fires of insanity were already burning in the brain of the convict's wife.
Revenge for past wrongs seemed the sole object of her life now, and this was the incentive that placed her on the track of a fleeing villain and his intended victim.
Madge saw Ruggles when he left the car. She watched her opportunity, and lifting the partially insensible girl, bore her swiftly to the outside, as the train halted for a minute.
She gave vent to a chuckle as the train went thundering on its course.
She had passed from the cars on the opposite side from the depot, and consequently was able to elude the gaze of the depot agent.
Along the track she went, pausing at times to rest, until she was fully a mile from the station. In the shadow of a clump of trees the hag came to a halt and deposited her burden on the ground.
A moan from the drugged and helpless Nell reached her ears.
And then Mrs. Scarlet chuckled the louder.
"Good; she's coming out of her bad spell. I want her to realize her fate, else there wouldn't be the least bit of pleasure in my revenge."
Removing veil and light cloak, Mrs. Scarlet gazed down into the pallid face of poor Nell, with only hatred gleaming from her sunken, beady eyes.
"Ho! I've outwitted the master devil himself, and now I will have you all to myself, to deal with in a way that will cut to the quick when Dyke Darrel hears of it."
Nell had on only a light summer robe under the shawl. She looked very innocent and beautiful as she lay there under the gaze of that human hyena.
"Pretty's a picture," hissed the wicked Madge. "I'll all the more delight in seeing you suffer. Ah! she is coming out of her stupor. How do you feel, dear?"
Nell had opened her eyes and gazed at the wicked face above her, in a dazed semi-consciousness.
No answer was vouchsafed.
Then, in looking about, the gleam of steel lines under the moon's rays seemed to attract the notice of Mrs. Scarlet for the first time--the straight lines that marked the course of the Erie road.
Their glitter seemed to offer a diabolical suggestion to Madge Scarlet.
"Ha! I have it."
Springing to her feet, she laid her arms about the slender form of the helpless girl, and, lifting her, walked swiftly to the railway track. In the centre, between the rails, she deposited her burden.
"Revenge! sweet revenge!" cackled the hag in a blood-curdling voice.
Again the girl moved and moaned; yet she seemed unable to change her position.
"Rest yourself comfortably, my girl; you won't be in trouble long," muttered the demon woman, with a grin that was absolutely sickening.
Poor Nell! She lay quite still after that, between the fatal rails, only giving sign of life by a faint moan occasionally.
Mrs. Scarlet retired to her leafy covert to wait the outcome. She could see far beyond the track a farm-house, and near her a heap of ties, and a rude fence--the moonlight revealed everything plainly. Chuckling with hideous satisfaction, the she demon waited the coming of the express that could not be far distant. Morning was already brightening the East.
Far away was the sound of a moving train. The sullen, distant roar sent a thrill to the heart of the demon woman, who crouched in the bushes to await the completion of her unhallowed revenge.
The sullen jar seemed to act like a shock of electricity on the nerves of Nell Darrel. She felt a strange and awful numbness. With a mighty effort the girl roused herself to a consciousness of her awful position.
Louder and louder roared the train. It was but a mile distant now, and the road was straight.
Nell raised her head, and resting on her hands gazed down the track where, in the distance, gleamed the light of the locomotive.
"God help me!" moaned the poor girl. Then she tried to throw herself from the track, but she could not. Her limbs were numb, and refused to obey her will.
A wild laugh rang out on the moonlit air.
Madge Scarlet sprang up and glared through the bushes at her victim with maniacal delight.
"Ha' ha! You cannot escape! Them pretty limbs'll be crushed and torn asunder! the white flesh cut and gashed, and that delicate body made a horrid mass of blood and mangled fragments! THEN I will present them to you, Dyke Darrel. Ho! ho!"
Her voice was raised to a high pitch now, and even reached the ears of the startled Nell.
No help, no hope!
On thundered the iron monster.
On and on till the eye of the engineer catches sight of something on the track--SOMETHING!
Quickly the engine is reversed and the air brakes come into play.
Too late!
A moan of agonized terror falls from the lips of the half dead girl, and then she sank helplessly to the ground. At the same instant help came from an unexpected source.
A man dashed swiftly through the moonlight and flung a heavy oak tie in front of the slackened engine.
A rumble and a jar, and then the train came to a dead stop, within three feet of the prostrate girl!
It was a narrow escape.
The man who had come so unexpectedly out of the shadows dragged Nell from her dangerous position. The engineer and fireman came down and congratulated the young man on his presence.
"The brakes couldn't quite do it," said the engineer. "That tie saved the girl, with no damage to the train."
"It seems to be a lucky accident all round," said the young man, who had laid Nell on a safe spot, and now turned his attention to assisting in removing the obstruction from the rails.
"Yes. Who is she?"
"I can't say."
"Well, I must be on the way," uttered the engineer, "we are behind time now."
By this time the conductor was on the ground, but the train was running again, and he received a full explanation from the engineer afterward.
When the young man made a closer inspection of the girl he had rescued, a cry of surprise fell from his lips.
"As I live, it is Nell Darrel!"
But she could not speak to thank him for his act, since she had fainted.
Lifting her tenderly the young man turned his steps in the direction of the farm-house, where he had been stopping during the past two days.
"Curse you! curse you!" were the venomous words flung after the man by Madge Scarlet.
But she dared not interfere to prevent the rescue.
When Nell Darrel again opened her eyes, it was to find herself calmly resting on a couch in a little room, whose cozy appearance was like home indeed. And the face that bent over her was not that of a stranger. Could it be that she was dreaming?
"Thank Heaven!" murmured a manly voice, and then a mustached lip bent and pressed a clinging kiss to the cheek of poor Nell.
"Harry, dear Harry!"
Thus had the lovers met after many long months of separation.
A smile rested on the face of the fair girl as she held Harry's hand while he talked of the past.
She explained as best she could the strangeness of her situation; but everything was so much like a dream, it was a hard matter to reconcile some of the events of the past few weeks.
"The end draws nigh," assured young Bernard, after a time. "If the notorious man calling himself Ruggles was on the train, he will, on discovering his loss, turn back, and then I will capture him." _