find the house without her. I know the course I should take. At any rate, I should be miserable if any evil should come of my neglect of the old man's request. There can be no real dangers, and I will not imagine any."
Still, after the family were all hushed in repose, and Jane had stolen from her bed and dressed herself for her secret expedition, she shrunk involuntarily from the task before her. "I do not like this mystery," said she, mentally; "I wish I had told my aunt, and asked David to go with me, or I might have told Mary Hull. There could have been no harm in that. But it is now too late. John said, I might save life, and I will think of nothing else."
She rose from the bed, where she had seated herself to ponder, for the last time, upon the difficulties before her, crept softly down stairs, passed her aunt's room, and got clear of the house unmolested, except by a slight growl from Brutus, the house-dog, whose dreams she had broken, but, at her well-known kindly patting, and "Lie down Brutus, lie down," he quietly resumed his sleeping posture. Her courage was stimulated by having surmounted one obstacle. The waning moon had risen, and shed its mild lustre over the peaceful scene. "Now," thought Jane, "that I have stirred up my womanish thoughts with a manly spirit, I wonder what I could have been afraid of."
Anxious to ascertain whether she was to have
