As Esmeralda rode along between her two captors, she felt that they were ascending one of the hills, and then that they were going down on the other side. Neither of the men spoke, and at last she said:

“Will you not take this thing off my head?”

“Not yet,” growled the man on her right.

She knew that prayers and protestations would be of no avail, and said no more.

It would be vain to deny that she was frightened; but she was not overcome by terror, and she was able to reason. It occurred to her that they did not mean to kill her, or they would have shot her long before this. It was not the first time she had been in danger; for in the rough and lawless camps which first dotted the wilds of Australia, life was not held of much account, and men—and women, too—were often in peril of life and limb.

She had been reared amid scenes which would have terrified a London girl to death, and her nerve, strengthened by her rough experiences, did not desert her at this juncture. Once or twice she could even feel that she was capable of a smile, though the smile did not actually come. Very few duchesses had ridden across Australian hills with their heads muffled in[302] a cloth and a couple of ruffians with drawn revolvers at her side. If Lilias could only see her now!

After a considerable ride, they pulled up; the man lifted her from the horse, and taking her hand, led her into a hut; Esmeralda offering no resistance, for she knew it would be worse than useless.

The man removed the cloth from her head, and, passing her hand across her eyes—for they were confused by their long blindfolding—she saw that she was in a diggers’ hut. A woman stood by a table holding a candle in her hand. Esmeralda’s heart rose as she saw her, and she looked at her with more than the usual feminine curiosity—with an anxious scrutiny. The woman was middle-aged, with a careworn face which was not altogether repellant. She glanced at Esmeralda, then looked at Simon, as if awaiting his orders.

“We’ve brought her,” said Simon, shortly. Then he turned to Esmeralda: “So long as you keep quiet and behave yourself, nobody’ll do yer any harm; I’d advise you not to make any attempt to get away.”

Esmeralda said nothing, but stood looking at the woman.

“Give her some food,” said Simon, “and make her comfortable. We’ve no grudge against her, as long as she doesn’t try to escape. We’re outside, remember,” he added, to Esmeralda.

The two men went out, and Esmeralda sunk into a chair. The woman put some food on the table and motioned Esmeralda to eat and drink. She drank some tea and nibbled at some bread and butter, though, as may be well understood, she was not much inclined for eating; but she deemed it best to put on a cheerful countenance and affect to take things coolly.

“Will you tell me your name?” she asked the woman.

The woman bit her lip, as if she found it difficult to resist the fascination of the sweet voice and the lovely, pleading eyes.

“My name don’t matter,” she said. “You’d best not talk.”

She glanced unconsciously toward the door.

Esmeralda smiled a little wearily.

“Why not?” she said, pleasantly. “There’s no harm in talking, surely, and I shall not say anything that I mind their hearing. Do you know how long I am to be kept here?”

The woman shook her head.

“I don’t know anything,” she said, “and I couldn’t tell you if I did. Them’s my orders, and I’ve got to obey them.”

She sighed as she spoke, and Esmeralda quickly divined that[303] the woman was an unwilling participant in her capture and detention. Out of pity for her she refrained from asking any more questions, but finished her tea and sat silent, with her head upon her hand.

“You’d best lie down,” said the woman; and she pointed to a rough bed in the corner.

“Thank you,” said Esmeralda, gently, as she got up and went to the bed; but she made no pretense of sleeping, and lay on her elbow, watching the woman thoughtfully.

“Will you not let me help you wash up?” she said, presently. “I’m not used to sitting by and seeing others at work that I can help in.”

The woman shook her head.

“You look like a great lady,” she said, reluctantly, and as if she could not help speaking, which was not strange, for few men and women in the great world of London had been able to resist the subtle fascination of Esmeralda’s manner.

“I am Esmeralda of Three Star Camp,” she said; “that is all.”

The woman stopped in the process of washing up, and looked at her with an interest marked by the same reluctance.

“I heard somewhere that you was a great lady,” she said—“that you was a lady by birth and in your own right.”

“Well, I suppose I am,” said Esmeralda, with a little laugh, for it struck her as comical that she should be the Duchess of Belfayre. “But it doesn’t much matter, does it, seeing that I’m a prisoner here?” Then suddenly a thought flashed upon her. “Do you think they want money?” she asked. “Because, if so—”

The woman shook her head.

“I don’t know anything about it; I don’t think so.”

Esmeralda dropped back with a sigh.

Simon had really made a very great mistake. Instead of applying to Varley Howard for ransom, he should have obtained a written promise for a sum of money from Esmeralda; but he had either not thought of this, or deemed it better to obtain cash on the nail.

“If it is money they want,” said Esmeralda, “I would give them what they asked. I am not anxious or afraid about myself, but I know what trouble they will be in at Three Star.” Her voice faltered for the first time, and she turned her head aside. “Go and tell them what I say.”

The woman hesitated for a moment or two, then she went to the door and spoke to the man on guard there.

“It ain’t for me to say,” Esmeralda heard him answer.[304] “Simon’s gone away for a bit; she can speak to him when he comes back.”

The woman continued talking for a minute or two, and during that time Esmeralda looked round the hut. She saw a man’s coat hanging on a nail, and her quick eyes caught the glint of a revolver stock protruding from the pocket. She darted from the bed noiselessly, snatched the revolver from the pocket, and concealed it in the folds of her dress as she lay down again in her former attitude. The woman came back to the table and stolidly took up a plate.

“It can’t be done now,” she said; “you’ll have to wait.”

“Very well,” said Esmeralda, with a sigh.

Then she let her head fall upon the pillow and closed her eyes, to think, not to sleep.

She knew she was not in a camp, by the intense silence around, and she rightly judged that she had been brought to a hut on one of the deserted claims which were so numerous in the district. When once a claim was deserted, it was not only neglected, but shunned as a place of ill luck. No doubt Simon had taken refuge here from the police. No one was likely to pass in this direction, and no one could approach without giving Simon timely warning. She was a prisoner on this lonely hill, utterly helpless, and in the power of two unscrupulous men. But was she helpless? Her hand closed upon the revolver, and her heart beat with a throb of that spirit which she had breathed into her with the free air of Three Star. She had heard that Simon had gone; there was, therefore, only one man on guard, and this woman who bore her no ill will. She began to think of escape, and her heart beat so fast that she could almost fancy the woman would hear it. She opened her eyes from time to time and looked at the woman, measuring her, as it were, and asking herself whether she was a match for her in strength.

It was evident by Simon’s leaving them and the carelessness of the guard outside—for she could hear him snoring at intervals—that it had not occurred to them that she should dare to make any attempt at escape, by which they proved that they did not know Esmeralda of Three Star. She lay still, thinking intently. All her married life passed before her as in a panorama. She wondered where Trafford was at that moment. Perhaps he had obtained a divorce and was going to marry Lady Ada; her eyelids quivered, and a long sigh broke from her parched lips. The woman started.

“I thought you were asleep,” she said.

Esmeralda smiled.

[305]

“Would you be able to sleep if you were in my place?” she asked.

The woman bit her lip.

“I’d try to sleep, all the same,” she said, doggedly. “P’r’aps you’re cold; I’ll get you another blanket.”

She passed behind the bed and reached up to a shelf for the blanket. As she did so, Esmeralda rose, and gliding behind her, touched her on the forehead with the muzzle of the revolver.

“Don’t cry out, don’t speak!” she said in a whisper.

The woman dropped her arms and turned her head away with a startled and terrified expression on her careworn face.

“Don’t be frightened,” said Esmeralda in the lowest of whispers. “I am not going to shoot you—but you can pretend I am—I mean to escape, and you may as well help me, while pretending not to. Don’t speak! You’re a woman like myself; think of what your friends would be suffering if you had been carried off as I have been—if you were in the same danger as I am! It is of them I am thinking more than myself, and I mean to get away.”

The woman trembled, though more in fear of the men than Esmeralda, as Esmeralda felt.

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