"My dear, let me help you in your trouble."
It was like the voice of an angel who had come to her rescue. She threw her arms about him, and cried, in a voice of exhaustion:
"It's what I've come for, my dear," said the wagoner, holding her up. "Where is your home?"
"Home!" she echoed, hysterically, "I have none! I am alone in the world--alone, alone!"
"Take me from the river. Hark! Do you not hear what it is whispering to me? I am exhausted; my strength is gone, and I can no longer resist. If you leave me here I shall die!"
"It does not matter. Anywhere, anywhere, so that I can have rest. Hide me--hide me! Oh, my heart, my heart!"
Upon this she burst into a passionate fit of weeping, and the good wagoner saw that she was not in a fit state to answer further questions. Endeavoring to calm her, he assisted her down the hill to where his team was standing, but before they reached it she swooned. It was not an easy task to lift her into the shelter of his wagon, but he managed it, and made up a bed of straw upon which he laid her. Then he started his horses again, and was careful to avoid ruts, in order not to jolt his fair guest too roughly. He had the whole day before him, and it would do if he reached his home before night. Now and again he mounted the wagon to look at Emilia, and was concerned that he could obtain no coherent words from her. The poor girl's trials had produced their effect upon her weak frame, and she was fast relapsing into delirium. All that he could distinguish in her feverish mutterings were the words, "I am innocent, I am innocent! I have done no wrong. God will speak for me!" Even these pathetic utterances came from her at intervals, and he had to piece them together. Her youth and beauty deeply impressed the kind-hearted man, and he did not regret the course he had taken. In the middle of the day he arrived at a village, and gave his horses two hours' rest. He utilized these two hours by hunting up a doctor, who, feeling Emilia's pulse and putting his hand on her hot forehead, said, "She is in a high state of fever. The only thing you can do is to get her home as quickly as possible." He believed her to be the wagoner's daughter, and he gave the old man a draught which Emilia was to be persuaded to take, should she have an interval of consciousness before they reached their journey's end. The wagoner's anxiety now was to get home as soon as possible, and the roads being good he put his horses to a trot. At six o'clock in the evening the journey was over, and the team stood at the door of his cottage. His old wife ran out to greet him, and he rapidly explained to her what he had done, and why he had done it.