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as soon as her head touched the pillow.

 
    Alas, regardless of their doom
    The little victims play!
    No sense have they of ills to come,
    N or care beyond today.
    Thomas Gray
     
     
     
    Chapter 2
    S ABRINA happily descended the stairs, her thoughts centered solely on the lovely summer morning. Birds were chirping melodiously from boughs near the open casement windows, and the scent of roses was carried in with the slight breeze.
    She barely resembled the armed highwayman of the night before in her light blue silk damask gown with a creamy yellow, quilted satin petticoat showing in front. Her long black hair had been waved back from her face and secured in a simple knot atop her head, the thick coil looking too heavy for her slender neck that rose like a fragile stem from the bodice of her gown. Golden rings pierced her ears and gleamed on her fingers, and as she checked the gold watch slung from a chain around her neck she looked up sheepishly.
    "I've overslept horridly, haven't I?" she called to Mary, who was arranging a vase of fragrant lilies in the center of
    the oak table in the hall. "And it's such a beautiful day, I hate to waste a minute of it."
    "I know, but I've the accounts to settle and the linen to check before we can go on the picnic you're planning," Mary smiled.
    "Always practical, Mary. And I have yet to keep a secret from you. Is there nothing you don't know?" she teased as she lifted a lily from the woven basket and held it to her nose.
    Mary's smile faded. "You know how I wish I didn't have the sight, Sabrina. I don't want to see the future. It frightens me. I have this feeling, this dread"—Mary paused thought-fully—"this awful fear that something is about to happen to cause everything to fall in upon us."
    "You've seen something since last night, haven't you? You weren't this nervous then," Sabrina said.
    Mary shook her head. "No, it's just that feeling again—nothing more. It's making me edgy." She smiled apologetically.
    "Something usually does happen, though, when you get these feelings."
    Mary looked into Sabrina's clear violet eyes, tears clouding her strangely light, gray ones and cried, "Oh, Sabrina, I don't want anything to happen to you."
    Mary dropped the lilies she held and hugged Sabrina to her. "You're so small and sweet, and yet so brave to risk your life for us. I just couldn't bear it if they should catch you."
    Sabrina shook her head admonishingly, returning her hug. "Silly goose. Nothing will happen to me. I have Will and John, and your gift to guide me. What can happen?" she laughed incredulously, full of confidence.
    "Now, shush." She held a finger to her lips. "We promised never to discuss this during the day in case we might be overheard by the servants. Anyway," Sabrina added, holding her arms out as if embracing the morning, "it's far too glorious to be worrying about what isn't about to happen."
    Mary shook her red head in defeat. "I give up. No one can resist you when you turn on the charm." She finished arranging the last lily and stood back to admire the effect, and obviously satisfied, turned to Sabrina.
    "Come along, you must be famished."
    "I'm absolutely starved. I can't understand how I manage to work up such an enormous appetite," Sabrina teased. "It must have something to do with the company I keep," she added innocently, a twinkle in her eyes.
    "Really, Sabrina, you're an incorrigible little minx," Mary laughed as they entered the dining room and she helped to fill her sister's plate from the sideboard laid with covered dishes.
    "Proper society ladies would look with horror upon what you're eating this early in the morning," Mary stated as she added sausage to the eggs and buttered toast on Sabrina's plate, taking a small plate with only bread and butter for herself.
    "I'd like to see them riding about at midnight and then be satisfied with a little piece of bread and butter," Sabrina replied as she swallowed a piece of sausage, and took a sip of hot tea. "Will