A heavy rope held
it fast to the ground.
Little was waiting for the ballast, when his eye caught Lady
Caroline's among the spectators. The glance was appealing. In a
moment he was at her side.
"I should like so much to get into the machine," said the arch-
hypocrite, demurely.
"Are you engaged to marry young Raby," said Little, bluntly.
"As you please," she said with a courtesy; "do I take this as a
refusal?"
Little was a gentleman. He lifted her and her lapdog into the car.
"How nice! it won't go off?"
"No, the rope is strong, and the ballast is not yet in."
A report like a pistol, a cry from the spectators, a thousand hands
stretched to grasp the parted rope, and the balloon darted upward.
Only one hand of that thousand caught the rope,--Little's! But in
the same instant the horror-stricken spectators saw him whirled
from his feet and borne upward, still clinging to the rope, into
space.
CHAPTER VII.*
* The right of dramatization of this and succeeding chapters is
reserved by the writer.
Lady Caroline fainted. The cold watery nose of her dog on her
cheek brought her to herself. She dared not look over the edge of
the car; she dared not look up to the bellying monster above her,
bearing her to death.
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