The Windham County reformer. (Battleboro, Vt.) 1876-1897, 1896-05-08
THE GREAT vermont STORY !
THE RAN G Frs
OR,
THE TORY'S DAUGHTER,
Bl JUDGE d. z. THOMPSON.
VOLUME ii.
CHAPTER lX, Continued. J

When Miss Haviland, on the ter
mipation of her compulsory journey,
arrived at the outposts of the British
army, she was conducted, by the order
# some one evidently appraised of her
coming, Immediately to her fathers
quarters. The old gentleman, at the
somewhat awkward meeting that now
-ook place between them, seemed both
surprised and gratified at seeing her
there :and though his manner BETRAYED
sort of guilty embarrassment arising.
rerhaps, from the consciousness of his
former harshness to her, he yet at once
and pointedly, disclaimed having had
any agency in her abduction, which
he laid TO the chances of war; ia
which, he commended, her perverse and
unadyised conduct had been the means
Of exposing her. Peters, ALSO who soon
made his appearance, joined in the
disclaimer: and rendering some EMMY
apologies for what had happened.
which. he said, grew out of the mis-
take of a subordinate officer in constru
ng an order in relation to taking nos
tages from them, in certain cases.
offered to convey her back, if she chose
il. as SOON as found consistent with
her safety. The offer, however, was
never repeated: and his own conduct
very soon beIied his assertions and CON
vinced her of the truth of her suspic-
ions from the first, that he was the
sole iustgator of the outrage she had
received, and that it was still his pur-
pose to detain her and keep her in
position which would enable him the
more efectually to prosecute his de
signs for although in the few formal
calls he continued to make at the
house. he never pressed his suit. but
seemed rather to avoid the subject, as
il determined to afford her no oppor-
tunity to repeat her former refusals,
she yet quickly perceived that he was
busy at his intrigues to bring about,
by the agency of others, and by secret
management, what by himself, or by
any open and honorable means. he de-
SPARED Of accomplishing. All this,
from day to day, unfolded itself in
the renewed opportunities and re-
proaches of her father, the added en-
treaties of Jones, the lover of Miss
camp to be married, in the reports
which had been put in circulation to
place her in a false light-that of a
prryerse and coquettish grim the
efforts made to force her into social
parties, where the opinions of all were
obviously forestalled, and especially in
the contrived introductions she was
compelled TO undergo to those who
had evidently been enlisted as inter
cessOrs among whom were some
whose ambiguous conduct often greatly
annoyed, and, at times, even filled her
bosom with perplexity and alarm.
Such was the position of the unhap
py girl at the time of her reluctant at
tendance as one of the guests of the |
merry party we have described. al
though annoyed, sickened, and dis
gusted at what she had daily wit
messed. and vexed, and indignant at
the contemplate articles and in
rigues Of Peters, which, however in
tended, were beginning to be the means
Of exposing her to new trials, yet, till
what took place at that party, she had
entertained no serious apprehension
mat any attempt would be made to co,
cree her into marriage which she had
sodecidedly repudiated.
But the announcement VIII ich had
just been so strangely made coming as
did from so powerful a parsonage,
and one, at the same time, whose
equlyocal behavior, when she had
casually met him, had excited her
deepest aversion, now gave her to un
lerstand that such an attempt was in
deed about to be made by the assumed
arbters of her fate, and that her re
Slstance to the contemplated scheme.
should she be able to make one against
Inc overawing influence that was about
10 be brought to bear upon her, and
even her acquiescence, she feared, was
. be followed by prosecutions, from the
thought of which she shrunk with
llsmay, She might have taken that