Chapter 31

Hence, bashful cunning!
And prompt me, plain and holy innocence;
I am your wife, if you will marry me.

--_Tempest_.

On joining Miss Peyton, Frances learned that Dunwoodie was not yet
returned; although, with a view to relieve Henry from the importunities
of the supposed fanatic, he had desired a very respectable divine of
their own church to ride up from the river and offer his services. This
gentleman was already arrived, and had been passing the half hour he had
been there, in a sensible and well-bred conversation with the spinster,
that in no degree touched upon their domestic affairs.

To the eager inquiries of Miss Peyton, relative to her success in her
romantic excursion, Frances could say no more than that she was bound to
be silent, and to recommend the same precaution to the good maiden also.
There was a smile playing around the beautiful mouth of Frances, while
she uttered this injunction, which satisfied her aunt that all was as it
should be. She was urging her niece to take some refreshment after her
fatiguing expedition, when the noise of a horseman riding to the door,
announced the return of the major. He had been found by the courier who
was dispatched by Mason, impatiently waiting the return of Harper to the
ferry, and immediately flew to the place where his friend had been
confined, tormented by a thousand conflicting fears. The heart of
Frances bounded as she listened to his approaching footsteps. It wanted
yet an hour to the termination of the shortest period that the peddler
had fixed as the time necessary to effect his escape. Even Harper,
powerful and well-disposed as he acknowledged himself to be, had laid
great stress upon the importance of detaining the Virginians during that
hour. She, however, had not time to rally her thoughts, before Dunwoodie
entered one door, as Miss Peyton, with the readiness of female instinct,
retired through another.

The countenance of Peyton was flushed, and an air of vexation and
disappointment pervaded his manner.

"'Twas imprudent, Frances; nay, it was unkind," he cried, throwing
himself in a chair, "to fly at the very moment that I had assured him of
safety! I can almost persuade myself that you delight in creating points
of difference in our feelings and duties."

"In our duties there may very possibly be a difference," returned his
mistress, approaching, and leaning her slender form against the wall;
"but not in our feelings, Peyton. You must certainly rejoice in the
escape of Henry!"

"There was no danger impending. He had the promise of Harper; and it is
a word never to be doubted. O Frances! Frances! had you known the man,
you would never have distrusted his