Chapter VIII: Part 8

There was a rush, and Hallam was torn from Millicent's grasp--from Christie Bayle's protecting arms, and with a yell the crowd rushed out into the street, lit now by the glow from the smashed hall windows and the fire that burned within.

"My husband! Christie--dear friend--help, oh, help!" wailed Millicent, as she tottered out to the front, in time to see Bayle literally leap to Hallam's side and again strike the leader down.

It was the last effort of his strength; and now a score of hands were tearing and striking at the wretched victim, when there was the clattering of horses' hoofs and a mounted man rode right into the crowd with half-a-dozen followers at his side.

"Stop!" he roared. "I am a magistrate. Constables: your duty."

The mob fell back, and as five men, with whom was Thickens, seized upon Hallam, Millicent tottered into the circle and sank at her husband's knees.

"Saved!" she sobbed, "saved!"

For the first time Hallam found his voice, and cried, as he tried to shake himself free:

"This--this is a mistake--constables. Loose me. These men--"

"It is no mistake, Mr Hallam, you are arrested for embezzlement," said the mounted man sternly.

"Three cheers for Sir Gordon Bourne and Dixons'," shouted one in the crowd.

Christie Bayle had just time to catch Millicent Hallam in his arms as her senses left her, and with a piteous moan she sank back utterly stunned.

VOLUME TWO, CHAPTER FOURTEEN.

WRITHING IN HER AGONY.

"Mother!--father! Oh, in heaven's name, speak to me! I cannot bear it. My heart is broken. What shall I do?"

"My poor darling!" sobbed Mrs Luttrell, holding her child to her breast and rocking to and fro, while the doctor sat with wrinkled face nursing and caressing Julia, who clung to him in a scared fashion, not having yet got over the terrors of the past night.

She had her arms about her grandfather, and nestled in his breast, but every now and then she started up to gaze piteously in his face.

"Would my dolls all be burnt, grandpa?"

"Oh, I hope not, my pet," he said soothingly; "but never mind if they are: grandpa will buy you some better ones."

"But I liked those, grandpa, and--and is my little bed burnt too?"

"No, my pet; I think not. I hope not. They put the fire out before it did a great deal of harm."

The child laid her head down again for a few moments, and then looked up anxiously.

"Thibs says the bad men tore the place all to pieces last night and broke all the furniture and looking-glasses. Oh! grandpa, I--I--I--"

Suffering still from the nervous shock of the nocturnal alarm, the poor child's breast heaved, and she burst into a pitiful fit of sobbing, which was some time before it subsided.

"Don't think about it all, my pet," said the doctor, tenderly stroking the soft little head. "Never mind about the old house, you shall come and live here with grandpa, and we'll have such games in the old garden again."

"Yes, and I may smell the flowers, and--and--but I want our own house too."

"Ah, well, we shall see. There, you are not to think any more about that now."

"Why doesn't Mr Bayle come, grandpa? Did the bad people hurt him very much?"

"Oh no, my darling: he's all right, and he punished some of them."

"And when will papa come?"

"Hush, child," cried Millicent in a harsh, strange voice, "I cannot hear to hear you."

The child looked at her in a scared manner and clung to her grandfather, but struggled from his embrace directly after, and ran to her mother, throwing her arms about her, and kissing her and sobbing.

"Oh, my own dear, dear mamma!"

"My darling, my darling!" cried Millicent, passionately clasping her to her breast; and Mrs Luttrell drew away to leave them together, creeping quietly to the doctor's side, and laying her hand upon his shoulder, looking a while in his eyes as if asking whether she were doing wisely.

The doctor nodded, and for a few minutes there was no sound heard but Millicent's sobs.

"I wish Mr Bayle would come," said Julia all at once in her silvery childish treble.

"Silence, child!" cried Millicent fiercely. "Father dear, speak to me; can you not help me in this trouble? You know the charge is all false?"

"My darling, I will do everything I can."

"Yes, yes, I know, but every one seems to have turned against us--Sir Gordon, Mr Bayle, the whole town. It is some terrible mistake: all some fearful error. How dare they charge my husband with a crime?"

She gazed fiercely at her father as she spoke, and the old man stood with his arms about Mrs Luttrell and his lips compressed.

"You do not speak," cried Millicent; "surely you are not going to turn against us, father?"

"Oh! Milly, my own child," sobbed Mrs Luttrell, running to her to take her head to her breast, "don't speak to us like that; as if your father would do anything but help you."

"Of course, of course," cried Millicent excitedly; "but there, I must put off all this pitiful wailing."

She rose in a quiet, determined way, and wiped her eyes hastily, arranged her hair, and began to walk up and down the room. Then, stopping, she forced a smile, and bent down and kissed Julia, sending a flash of joy through her countenance.

"Go and look round the garden, darling. Pick mamma a nice bunch of flowers."

"Will you come too, grandpa?" cried the child eagerly.

"I'll come to you presently, darling," said the doctor nodding; and the child bounded to the open window with a sigh of relief, but ran back to kiss each in turn.

"Now we can speak," cried Millicent, panting, as she forced herself to be calm. "There is no time for girlish sobbing when such a call as this is made upon me. The whole town is against poor Robert; they have wrecked and burnt our house, and they have cast him into prison."

"My darling, be calm, be calm," said the doctor soothingly.

"Yes, I am calm," she said, "and I am going to work--and help my husband. Now tell me, What is to be done first? He is in that dreadful place."

"Yes, my child, but leave this now. I will do all I can, and will tell you everything. You have had no sleep all night; go and lie down now for a few hours."

"Sleep! and at a time like this!" cried Millicent. "Now tell me. He will be brought up before the magistrates to-day?"

"Yes, my child."

"And he must have legal advice to counteract all this cruel charge that has been brought against him. Poor fellow! so troubled as he has been of late."

The doctor looked at her with the lines in his forehead deepening.

"If they had given him time he would have proved to them how false all these attacks are. But we are wasting time. The lawyer, father, and he will have to be paid. You will help me, dear; we must have some money."

The doctor exchanged glances with his wife.

"You have some, of course?" he said, turning to Millicent.

"I? No. Robert has been so pressed lately. But you will lend us all we want. You have plenty, father."

The doctor was silent, and half turned away.

"Father!" cried Millicent, catching his hand, "don't you turn from me in my distress. I tell you Robert is innocent, and only wants time to prove it to all the world. You will let me have the money for his defence?"

The doctor remained silent.

"Father!" cried Millicent in a tone of command.

"Hush! my darling; your poor father has no money," sobbed Mrs Luttrell, "and sometimes lately we have not known which way to turn for a few shillings."

"Oh, father!" cried Millicent reproachfully. "But there's the house. You must borrow money on its security, enough to pay for the best counsel in London. Robert will repay you a hundredfold."

The doctor turned away and walked to the window.

"Father!" cried Millicent, "am I your child?"

"My child! my darling!" he groaned, coming quickly back, "how can you speak to me in such a tone?"

"How can you turn from me at such a time, when the honour of my dear husband is at stake? What are a few paltry hundred pounds to that? You cannot, you shall not refuse. There, I know enough of business for that. The lawyers will lend you money on the security of this house. Go at once, and get what is necessary. Why do you hesitate?"

"My poor darling!" cried Mrs Luttrell piteously, "don't, pray don't speak to your father like that."

"I must help my husband," said Millicent hoarsely. "Yes, yes, and you shall, my dear; but be calm, be calm. There, there, there."

"Mother, I must hear my father speak," said Millicent sternly. "I come to him in sore distress and poverty. My home has been wrecked by last night's mob, my poor husband half killed, and torn from me to be cast into prison. I come to my father for help--a few pitiful pounds, and he seems to side with my husband's enemies."

"Milly, my darling, I'll do everything I can," cried the doctor; "but you ask impossibilities. The house is not mine."

"Not yours, father?"

"Hush! hush, my dear!" sobbed Mrs Luttrell. "I can't explain to you now, but poor papa was obliged to sell it a little while ago."

"Where is the money?" said Millicent fiercely.

"It was all gone before--the mortgages," said Mrs Luttrell.

"And who bought it?" cried Millicent.

"Mr Bayle."

There was a pause of a few moments' duration, and then the suffering woman seemed to flash out into a fit of passion.

"Mr Bayle again!" she cried.

"Yes, Mr Bayle, our friend."

At that moment there came a burst of merry laughter from the garden, the sounds floating in through the open window with the sweet scents of the flowers, and directly after Julia, looking flushed and happy, appeared, holding Christie Bayle's hand.

Bayle paused as he saw the group within, and then slowly entered.

"Mamma, I knew Mr Bayle would come!" cried Julia excitedly. "But, oh, look at him, he has hurt himself so! He is so--so--oh, I can't bear it, I can't bear it!"

The memories of the past night came back in a flash--the hurried awaking from sleep, the dressing, the sounds of the mob, the breaking windows, the fire, and the wild struggle; and the poor child sobbed hysterically and trembled, as Bayle sank upon his knees and took her to his breast.

There she clung, while he caressed her and whispered comforting words, Millicent the while standing back, erect and stern, and Mrs Luttrell and the doctor with troubled countenances looking on.

In a few minutes the child grew calm again, and then, without a word, Millicent crossed to the fireplace and rang the bell. It was answered directly by the doctor's maid.

"Send Thisbe here," said Millicent sternly.

In another minute Thisbe, who looked very white and troubled, appeared at the door, gazing sharply from one to the other.

"Julie, go to Thisbe," said Millicent in a cold, harsh voice.

The child looked up quickly, and clung to Bayle, as she gazed at her mother with the same shrinking, half-scared look she had so often directed at her father.

"Julie!"

The child ran across to Thisbe, and Bayle bit his lip, and his brow contracted, for he caught the sound of a low wail as the door was closed.

Then, advancing to her, with his face full of the pity he felt, Bayle held out his hand to Millicent, and then let it fall, as she stood motionless, gazing fiercely in his face, till he lowered his eyes, and his head sank slowly, while he heaved a sigh.

"You have come, then," she said, "come to look upon your work. You have come to enjoy your triumph. False friend! Coward! Treacherous villain! You have cast my husband into prison, and now you dare to meet me face to face!"

"Mrs Hallam! Millicent!" he cried, looking up, his face flushing as he met her eyes, "what are you saying?"

"The truth!" she cried fiercely. "He knew you better than I. He warned me against you. His dislike had cause. I, poor, weak, trusting woman, believed you to be our friend, and let you crawl and enlace yourself about our innocent child's heart, while all the time you were forming your plans, and waiting for your chance to strike!"

"Mrs Hallam," said Bayle calmly, and with a voice full of pity, "you do not know what you are saying."

"Not know! when my poor husband told me all!--how you waited until he was in difficulties, and then plotted with that wretched menial Thickens to overthrow him! I know you now: cowardly, cruel man! Unworthy of a thought! But let me tell you that you win no triumph. You thought to separate us--to make the whole world turn from him whom you have cast into prison. You have succeeded in tightening the bonds between us. The trouble will pass as soon as my husband's innocency is shown, while your conduct will cling to you, and show itself like some stain!"

A look as angry as her own came over his countenance, but it passed in a moment, and he said gravely: "I came to offer you my sympathy and help in this time of need."

"Your help, your sympathy!" cried Millicent scornfully. "You, who planned, here, in my presence, with Sir Gordon, my husband's ruin! Leave this house, sir! Stay! I forgot. By your machinations you are master here. Mother, father, let us go. The world is wide, and heaven will not let such villainy triumph in the end."

"Oh, hush! hush!" exclaimed Bayle sternly. "Mrs Hallam, you know not what you say. Doctor, come on to me, I wish to see you. Dear Mrs Luttrell, let me assist you all I can. Good-bye! God help you in your trouble. Good-bye!"

He bent down and kissed the old lady; and as he pressed her hand she clung to his, and kissed it in return.

"Good-bye, Mrs Hallam," he said, holding out his hand once more.

She turned from him with a look of disgust and loathing, and he went slowly out, as he had come, with his head bent, along the road, and on to the market-place.

VOLUME TWO, CHAPTER FIFTEEN.

A CRITICAL TIME.

There was only one bit of business going on in King's Castor that morning among the mechanics, and that was where two carpenters were busy nailing boards across the gaping windows and broken door of Hallam's house.

The ivy about the hall window was all scorched, and the frames of that and two windows above were charred, but only the hall, staircase, and one room had been burned before the fire was extinguished. The greater part of the place, though, was a wreck, the mob having wreaked their vengeance upon the furniture when Hallam was snatched from their hands by the law; and for about an hour the self-constituted avengers of the customers at Dixons' Bank had behaved like Goths.

It was impossible for work to go on with such a night to canvass. One group, as Bayle approached, was watching the little fire-engine, and the drying of its hose which was hauled up by one end over the branch of an oak-tree at Poppin's Corner.

There was nothing to see but the little, contemptible, old-fashioned pump on wheels; still fifty people, who had seen it in the belfry every Sunday as they went to church, stopped to stare at it now.

But the great group was round about the manager's house, many of them being the idlers and scamps of the place, who had been foremost in the destruction.

The public-houses had their contingents; and then there were the farmers from all round, who had driven in, red-hot with excitement; and, as soon as they had left their gigs or carts in the inn-yard, were making their way up to the bank.

Some did not stop to go to the inn, but were there in their conveyances, waiting for the bank to open, long before the time, and quite a murmur of menace arose, when, to the very moment, James Thickens, calm and cool and drab as usual, threw open the door, to be driven back by a party of those gathered together.

Fortunately the news had spread slowly, so that the crowd was not large; but it was augmented by a couple of score of the blackguards of the place, hungry-eyed, moist of lip, and ready for any excuse to leap over the bank counter and begin the work of plunder.

For the first time in his life James Thickens performed that feat-- leaping over the counter to place it between himself and the clamorous mob, who saw Mr Trampleasure there and Sir Gordon Bourne in the manager's room, with the door open, and something on the table.

"Here--Here"--"Here--Me"--"No, me."

"I was first."

"No, me, Thickens."

"My money."

"My cheque."

"Change these notes."

The time was many years ago, and there were no dozen or two of county constabulary to draft into the place for its protection. Hence it was that as Thickens stood, cool and silent, before the excited crowd, Sir Gordon, calm and stern, appeared in the doorway with a couple of pistols in his left hand, one held by the butt, the other by the barrel passed under his thumb.

"Silence!" he cried in a quick, commanding tone.

"I am prepared--"

"Yah! No speeches. Our money! Our--"

"Silence!" roared Sir Gordon. "We are waiting to pay all demands."

"Hear, hear! Hooray!" shouted one of the farmers, who had come in hot haste, and his mottled face grew calm.

"But we can't--"

"Yah--yah!" came in a menacing yell.

"Over with you, lads!" cried a great ruffian, clapping his hands on the counter and making a spring, which the pressure behind checked and hindered, so that he only got one leg on the counter.

"Back, you ruffian!" cried Sir Gordon, taking a step forward, and, quick as lightning, presenting a pistol at the fellow's head. "You, Dick Warren, I gave you six months for stealing corn. Move an inch forward, and as I am a man I'll fire."

There was a fierce murmur, and then a pause.

The great ruffian half crouched upon the counter, crossing his eyes in his fear, and squinting crookedly down the pistol barrel, which was within a foot of his head.

"I say, gentlemen and customers, that Mr Thickens here is waiting to pay over all demands on Dixons' Bank."

"Hear, hear!" cried the farmer who had before spoken.

"But there are twenty or thirty dirty ruffians among you, and people who do not bank with us, and I must ask you to turn them out."

There was a fierce murmur here, and Sir Gordon's voice rose again high and clear.

"Mr Trampleasure, you will find the loaded firearms ready in the upper room. Go up, sir, and without hesitation shoot down the first scoundrel who dares to throw a stone at the bank."

"Yes, Sir Gordon," said Trampleasure, who dared not have fired a piece to save his life, but who gladly beat a retreat to the first-floor window, where he stood with one short blunderbuss in his hand, and Mrs Trampleasure with the other.

"Now, gentlemen," cried Sir Gordon, "I am waiting for you to clear the bank."

There was another fierce growl at this; but the mottled-faced farmer, who had ridden in on his stout cob, and who carried a hunting crop with an old-fashioned iron hammer head, spat in his fist, and turned the handle--

"Now, neighbours and friends as is customers!" he roared in a stentorian voice, "I'm ready when you are." As he spoke he caught the man half on the counter by the collar, and dragged him off.

"Here, keep your hands off me!"

"Yow want to fight, yow'd--"

"Yah! hah!"

Then a scuffling and confused growl, and one or two appeals to sticks and fists; but in five minutes every man not known as a customer of the bank was outside, and the farmers gave a cheer, which was answered by a yell from the increasing mob, a couple of dozen of whom had stooped for stones and began to flourish sticks.

But the stout farmer, who was on the steps between the two pillars that flanked the entrance, put his hand to his mouth, as if about to give a view halloo!

"Look out for the bloonder-boosh, my lads." And then, turning his head up to the window where Mr Trampleasure stood, weapon in hand, "Tak' a good aim on the front, and gie it 'em--whang! Mr Trampleasure, sir. Thee'll scatter the sloogs fine."

Not a stone was thrown, and by this time James Thickens was busy at work cancelling with his quill pen, and counting and weighing out gold. He never offered one of Dixons' notes: silver and gold, current coin of the realm, was all he passed over the counter, and though the customers pressed and hurried to get their cheques or notes changed, Thickens retained his coolness and went on.

At the end of a quarter of an hour the excitement was subsiding, but the bank was still full of farmers and tradespeople, the big burly man with the hunting crop being still by the counter unpaid.

All at once, after watching the paying over of the money for some time, he began hammering the mahogany counter heavily with the iron handle of his whip.

"Here, howd hard!" he roared.

Sir Gordon, who had put the pistols on the table, and was sitting on the manager's chair, coolly reading his newspaper in full view, laid it down, and rose to come to the open glass door.

"Ay, that's right, Sir Gordon. I want a word wi' thee. I'm not a man to go on wi' fullishness; but brass is brass, and a hard thing to get howd on. Now, look ye here. Howd hard, neighbours, I hevn't got much to saya."

"What is it, Mr Anderson?" said Sir Gordon calmly.

"Why, this much, Sir Gordon and neighbours. Friend o' mine comes out o' the town this morning and says, `If thou'st got any brass i' Dixons' Bank, run and get it, lad, for Maester Hallam's bo'ted, and bank's boosted oop.' Now, Sir Gordon, it don't look as if bank hev boosted oop."

"Oh, no," said Sir Gordon, smiling.

"Hev Maester Hallam bo'ted, then, or is that a lie too?"

"I am sorry to say that Mr Hallam has been arrested on a charge of fraud."

"That be true, then?" said the farmer. "Well, now, look here, Sir Gordon; I've banked wi' you over twanty year, and I can't afford to lose my brass. Tween man and man, is my money safe?"

"Perfectly, Mr Anderson."

"That'll do, Sir Gordon," said the farmer, tearing up the cheque he held in his hand, and scattering it over his head. "I'll tak' Sir Gordon's word or Dixons' if they say it's all right. I don't want my brass."

"Gentlemen," said Sir Gordon, flashing slightly, "if you will trust me and my dear old friend Mr Dixon, you shall be paid all demands to the last penny we have. I am sorry to say that I have discovered a very heavy defalcation on the part of our late manager, and the loss will be large, but that loss will fall upon us, gentlemen, not upon you."

"But I want my deeds, my writings," cried a voice. "I'm not a-going to be cheated out o' my rights."

"Who is that?" said Sir Gordon.

"Mr Gemp, Sir Gordon," said Thickens quickly. "Deposit of deeds of row of houses in Rochester Close; and shares."

"Mr Gemp," said Sir Gordon, "I am afraid your deeds are amongst others that are missing."

"Ay! Ay! Robbers! Robbers!" shouted Gemp excitedly.

"No, Mr Gemp, we are not robbers," said Sir Gordon. "If you will employ your valuer, I will employ ours; and as soon as they have decided the amount, Mr James Thickens will pay you--to-day if you can get the business done, and the houses and shares are Dixons'."

"Hear, hear, hear," shouted Anderson. "There, neighbour, he can't say fairer than that."

"Nay, I want my writings, and I don't want to sell. I want my writings. I'll hev 'em too."

"Shame on you, Gemp," said a voice behind him. "Three days ago you were at death's door. Your life was spared, and this is the thank-offering you make to your neighbours in their trouble."

"Nay, don't you talk like that, parson, thou doesn't know what it is to lose thy all," piped Gemp.

"Lose?" cried Bayle, who had entered the bank quietly to see Sir Gordon. "Man, I have lost heavily too."

Thickens was making signs to him now with his quill pen.

"Ay, but I want my writings. I'll hev my writings," cried Gemp. "Neighbours, you have your money. Don't you believe 'em. They're robbers."

"If I weer close to thee, owd Gemp, I'd tak' thee by the scruff and the band o' thy owd breeches and pitch thee out o' window. Sir Gordon's ready to do the handsome thing."

"Touch me if you dare," cried old Gemp. "I want my writings. It was bank getting unsafe made me badly. You neighbours have all thy money out, for they haven't got enough to last long."

There was a fresh murmur here, and Sir Gordon looked anxious. Mr Anderson stood fast; but it was evident that a strong party were waiting for their money, and more than one began to twitch Thickens by the sleeve, and present cheques and notes.

Thickens paid no heed, but made his way to where Christie Bayle was standing, and handed him a pocket-book.

"Here," he said. "I couldn't come to you. I had to watch the bank."

"My pocket-book, Thickens?"

"Yes, sir. I was just in time to knock that scoundrel over as he was throttling you. I'd come to meet the coach."

"Why, Thickens!" cried Bayle, flushing--"Ah, you grasping old miser! What! turn thief?"

The latter was to old Gemp, who saw the pocket-book passed, and made a hawk-like clutch at it, but his wrist was pinned by Bayle, who took the pocket-book and slipped it into his breast.

"It's my papers--it's writings--it's--"

His voice was drowned in a clamour that arose, as about twenty more people came hurrying in at the bank-door, eager to make demands for their deposits.

Sir Gordon grew pale, for there was not enough cash in the house to meet the constant demand, and he had hoped that the ready payment of a great deal would quiet the run.

The clamour increased, and it soon became evident that the dam had given way, and that nothing remained but to go on paying to the last penny in the bank, while there was every possibility of wreck and destruction following.

"Howd hard, neighbours," cried Anderson; "Sir Gordon says it's all right. Dixons' 'll pay."

"Dixons' can't pay," shouted a voice. "Hallam's got everything, and the bank's ruined."

There was a roar here, and the fire seemed to have been again applied to the tow. Thickens looked in despair at Bayle, and then with a quick movement locked the cash drawer, and clapped the key in his pocket. The action was seen. There was a yell of fury from the crowd in front, and a dozen hands seized the clerk.

Sir Gordon darted forward, this time without pistols, and hands and sticks were raised, when in a voice of thunder Christie Bayle roared:

"Stop!"

There was instant silence, for he had leaped upon the bank counter.

"Stand back!" he said, "and act like Christian men, and not like wild beasts. Dixons' Bank is sound. Look here!"

"It's failed! it's failed!" cried a dozen voices.

"It has not failed," shouted Bayle. "Look here: I have been to London."

"Yes, we know."

"To fetch twenty-one thousand pounds--my own property!"

There was dead silence here.

"Look! that is the money, all in new Bank of England notes."

He tore them out of the large pocket-book.

"To show you my confidence in Dixons' Bank and in Sir Gordon Bourne's word, I deposit this sum with them, and open an account. Mr Thickens, have the goodness to enter this to my credit; I'll take a chequebook when you are at liberty."

He passed the sheaf of rustling, fluttering, new, crisp notes to the cashier, and then, taking Sir Gordon's offered hand, leaped down inside the counter of the bank.

"There, Sir Gordon," he said, with a smile, "I hope the plague is stayed."

"Christie Bayle," whispered Sir Gordon huskily, "Heaven bless you! I shall never forget this day!" Half-an-hour later the bank business was going on as usual, but the business of the past night and morning was more talked of than before.

VOLUME TWO, CHAPTER SIXTEEN.

IN MISERY'S DEPTHS.

One of many visits to the gloomy, stone-built, county gaol where Hallam was waiting his trial--for all applications for the granting of bail had been set aside--Millicent had insisted upon going alone, but without avail.

"No, Miss Milly, you may insist as long as you like; but until I'm berried, I'm going to keep by you in trouble, and I shall go with you."

"But Thibs, my dear, dear old Thibs," cried Millicent, flinging her arms about her neck, "don't you see that you will be helping me by staying with Julie?"

"No, my dear, I don't; and, God bless her! she'll be as happy as can be with her grandpa killing slugs, as I wish all wicked people were the same, and could be killed out of the way."

"But, Thibs, I order you to stay!"

"And you may order, my dear," said Thisbe stubbornly. "You might order, and you might cut off my legs, and then I'd come crawling like the serpent in the Scripters--only I hope it would be to do good."

"Oh, you make me angry with you, Thisbe. Haven't I told you that Miss Heathery has been pressing to come this morning, and I refused her?"

"Why, of course you did, my dear," replied Thisbe contemptuously. "Nice one she'd be to go with you, and strengthen and comfort you! Send her to your pa's greenhouse to turn herself into a pot, and water the plants with warm water, and crying all over, and perhaps she'd do some good; but to go over to Lindum! The idea! Poor little weak thing!"

"But, Thisbe, can you not see that this is a visit that I ought to pay alone?"

"No, miss."

"But it is: for my husband's sake."

"Every good husband who had left his wife in such trouble as you're in would be much obliged to an old servant for going with you all that long journey. There, miss, once for all--you may go alone, if you like, but I shall follow you and keep close to you all the time, and sit down at the prison gate."

"Oh, hush, Thibs!" cried Millicent, with a spasm of pain convulsing her features.

"Yes, miss, I understand. And now I'm going. I shan't speak a word to you; I shan't even look at you, but be just as if I was a nothing, and all the same I'm there ready for you to hear, and be a comfort in my poor way, so that you may lean on me as much as you like; and, please God, bring us all well out of our troubles. Amen."

Poor Thisbe's words were inconsequent, but they were sincere, and she followed her mistress to the coach, and then through the hilly streets of the old city, and finally, as she had suggested, seated herself upon a stone at the prison gates while her mistress went in.

The sound of lock and bolt chilled Millicent; the aspect of the gloomy, high-walled enclosure, with the loose bricks piled on the top to show where the wall had been tampered with, and to hinder escape, the very aspect, too, of the governor's house, with its barred windows to keep prisoners out, as the walls were to keep them in--a cage within a cage-- made her heart sink, and when after traversing stone passages, and hearing doors locked and unlocked, she found herself in the presence of her husband, her brain reeled, a mist came before her eyes, and for a while her tongue refused to utter the words she longed to speak.

"Humph!" said Hallam roughly. "You don't seem very glad to see me."

Her reproachful eyes gave him the lie; and, looking pale, anxious, and terribly careworn, he began to pace the floor.

The careful arrangement of the hair, the gentlemanly look, seemed to have given place to a sullen, half-shrinking mien, and it was plain to see how confinement and mental anxiety had told upon him.

In a few minutes, though, he had thrown off a great deal of this, and spoke eagerly to his wife, who, while tender and sympathetic in word and look, seemed ever ready to spur him on to some effort to free himself from the clinging stain.

This had been her task from the very first. Cast down with a feeling of degradation and sorrow, when the arrest had been made, she had, as we know, recoiled.

She had made every effort possible; had gone to her husband for advice and counsel, and had ended at his wish by taking the money Miss Heathery offered, to pay a good attorney to conduct his case; but on the first hearing, she was informed by the lawyer that a gentleman was down from town, a barrister of some eminence, who said that he had been instructed to defend Mr Hallam, and he declined to give any further information.

The despair that came over Millicent was terrible to witness; but she mastered these fits of despondency by force of will and the feverish energy with which she set to work. She visited Hallam, questioning, asking advice, instruction, and bidding him try to see his way out of the difficulty, till he grew morose and sullen, and seemed to find special pleasure in telling her that it was "all the work of that parson."

In her feverish state, in the despair with which she had bidden herself do her duty to her wronged, her injured husband, she took all this as fact, and shutting herself up at Miss Heathery's, refused to read the letters Bayle sent to her, or to give him an interview.

It was as if a savage spirit of hate and revenge had taken possession of her, and with blind determination she went on her way, praying for strength to make her worthy of the task of defending her injured husband, and for the overthrow of the cruel enemies who were fighting to work his ruin.

And now she was having the last interview with Hallam, for the authorities had interfered, she had had so much latitude, and he had given her certain instructions which made her start.

"Go to him?" she said, looking up wonderingly.

"Yes, of course," he said sharply; "do you wish me to lose the slightest chance of getting off?"

"But, Robert, dear," she said innocently, but with the energy that pervaded her speaking, "why not go bravely to your trial? The truth must prevail."

"Oh, yes," he said cynically; "it is a way it has in courts of law."

"Don't speak like that, love. I want you to hold up your head bravely in the face of your detractors, to show how you have been tricked and injured, that this man Crellock, whom you have helped, has proved a villain--deceiving, robbing, and shamefully treating you."

"Yes," he said; "I should like to show all that."

"Then don't send me to Sir Gordon. I feel that there is no mercy to be expected from either him or Mr Bayle. They both hate you."

"Most cordially, dear. By all that's wearisome, I wish they would let me have a cigar here."

"No, no; think of what you are telling me to do," she cried eagerly, as she saw him wandering from the purpose in hand. "You say I must go to Sir Gordon?"

"Yes. Don't say it outright, but give him to understand that if he will throw up this prosecution of his, it will be better for the bank. That I can give such information as will pay them."

"You know so much about Stephen Crellock?" she said quickly.

"Yes; I can recover a great deal, I am sure."

"And I am to show him how cruelly he has wronged you?"

"Yes, of course."

"You desire me to do this; you will not trust to your innocence, and the efforts of the counsel?"

"Do you want to drive me mad with your questions?" he cried savagely. "If you decline to go, my lawyer shall see Sir Gordon."

"Robert!" she said reproachfully, but with the sweet gentleness of her pitying love for the husband irritated, and beyond control of self in his trouble, apparent in her words.

"Well, why do you talk so and hesitate?" he cried petulantly.

"I will go, dear," she said cheerfully, "and I will plead your cause to the uttermost."

"Yes, of course. It will be better that you should go. He likes you, Millicent; he always did like you, and I dare say he will listen to you. I don't know but what it might be wise to knock under to Bayle. But no: I hate that fellow. I always did from the first. Well, leave that now. See Sir Gordon; tell him what I say, that it will be best for the bank. You'll win. Hang it, Millicent, I could not bear this trial: it would kill me."

"Robert!"

"Ah, well, I'm not going to die yet, and it would be very sad for my handsome little wife to be left a widow if they hang me, or to exist with a live husband serving one-and-twenty years in the bush."

"Robert, you will break my heart if you speak like that," panted Millicent.

"Ah, well, we must not do that," he cried laughingly. "Look here, though; this barrister who is to defend me, I know him--Granton, Q.C. Did your father instruct him?"

"No: he could not. Robert, we are frightfully poor."

"Ah! it is a nuisance," he said, "thanks to my enemies; but we'll get through. Now then, who has instructed this man?"

"I cannot tell, dear."

"I see it all," he said; "it's a plan of the enemy. They employ their own man, and he will sell me, bound hand and foot, to the Philistines."

"Oh! Robert, surely no one would be so base."

"I don't know," he said. "They want to win. It's Sir Gordon's doing. No, it's Christie Bayle. I'd lay a thousand pounds he has paid the fellow's fees."

"Then, Robert, you will not trust him; you will refuse to let him defend you. Husband, my brave, true, innocent husband," she cried, with her pale face flushing, "defend yourself!"

"Hush! Go to Sir Gordon at once. Say everything. I must be had out of this, Milly. I cannot stand my trial." She could only nod her acquiescence, for a gaoler had entered to announce that the visit was at an end.

Then, as if in a dream, confused, troubled in spirit, and hardly seeing her way for the mist before her eyes, Millicent Hallam followed the gaoler back along the white stone passages and through the clanging gates, to be shut out of the prison and remain in a dream of misery and troubled thought, conscious of only one thing, and that one that a gentle hand had taken her by the arm and led her back to where they waited for the conveyance to take them home.

"These handsome men; these handsome men!" sighed Thibs, as she sat by Julia's bed that night, tired with her journey, but reluctant to go to her own resting-place--a mattress upon the floor. "Oh! how I wish sometimes we were back at the old house, and me scolding and stubborn with poor old missus, and in my tantrums from morning to night. Ah! those were happy days."

Thisbe shook her head, and rocked herself to and fro, and sighed and sighed again.

"My old kitchen, and my old back door, and the big dust-hole! What a house it was, and how happy we used to be! Ah! if we could only change right back and be there once more, and Miss Milly not married to no handsome scamp. Ah! and he is; Miss Milly may say what she likes, and try to believe he isn't. He is a scamp, and I wish she had never seen his handsome face, and we were all back again, and then--Oh!--Oh! Oh!-- Oh!--Oh!" cried hard, stubborn Thisbe as she sank upon her knees by the child's bedside, sobbing gently and with the tears running down her cheeks, "and then there wouldn't be no you. Bless you! bless you! bless you!"

She kissed the child as a butterfly might settle on a flower, so tender was her love, so great her fear of disturbing the little one's rest.

"Oh! dear me, dear me!" she said, rising and wiping the tears from her hard face and eyes, "well, there's whites and blacks, and ups and downs, and pleasures and pains, and I don't know what to say--except my prayers; and the Lord knows what's best for us after all."

Ten minutes after, poor Thisbe was sleeping peacefully, while, with burning brow, Millicent was pacing her bed-room, thinking of the morrow's interview with Sir Gordon Bourne.

VOLUME TWO, CHAPTER SEVENTEEN.

MR GEMP IS CURIOUS.

"I know'd--I know'd it all along," said Old Gemp to his friends, for the excitement of his loss seemed now to have acted in an opposite direction and to be giving him strength. "I know'd he couldn't be living at that rate unless things was going wrong. What did the magistrates say?"

"Said it was a black case, and committed him for trial," replied Gorringe the tailor. "Ah, I don't say that clothes is everything, Mr Gemp; but a well-made suit makes a gentleman of a man, and you never heard of Mr Thickens doing aught amiss."

"Nor me neither, eh, Gorringe? and you've made my clothes ever since you've been in business."

The tailor looked with disgust at his neighbour's shabby, well-worn garments, and remained silent.

"I'd have been in the court mysen, Gorringe, on'y old Luttrell said he wouldn't be answerable for my life if I got excited again, and I don't want to die yet, neighbour; there's a deal for me to see to in this world."

"Got your money, haven't you?"

"Ye-es, I've got my money, and it's put away safe; but I wanted my deeds--my writings. I've lost by that scoundrel, horribly."

"Ah, well, it might have been worse," said Gorringe, giving a snip with his scissors that made Gemp start as if it were his own well-frayed thread of life being cut through.

"Oh, of course it might have been worse; but a lot of us have lost, eh, neighbour?"

"Dixons' and Sir Gordon have come down very handsome over it," said Gorringe, who was designing a garment, as he called it, with a piece of French chalk.

"And the parson," said Gemp; "only to think of it--a parson, a curate, with one-and-twenty thousand pound in his pocket."

"Ay, it come in handy," said Gorringe.

"Now, where did he get that money, eh? It's a wonderful sight for a man like him," said Gemp, with a suspicious look.

"London. I heerd tell that he said he had been to London to get it."

"Ay, he said so," cried Gemp, shaking his head, "but it looks suspicious, mun. Here was he hand and glove with the Hallams, always at their house and mixed up like. I want to know where he got that money. I say, sir, that a curate with twenty thousand pound of his own is a sort o' monster as ought to be levelled down."

The tailor pushed up his glasses to the roots of his hair, and left off his work to hold up his shears menacingly at his crony.

"Gemp, old man," he said, "I would not be such a cantankerous, suspicious old magpie as you for a hundred pounds; and look here, if you're going to pull buttons off the back o' parson's coat, go and do it somewhere else, and not in my shop."

"Oh! you needn't be so up," said Gemp. "Look here," he cried, pointing straight at his friend, "what did Thickens say about the writings?"

"Spoke fair as a man could speak," said Gorringe, resuming his architectural designs in chalk and cloth, "said he felt uncomfortable about the matter first when he saw Hallam give a package to a man named Crellock--chap who often come down to see him; that he was suspicious like that for two years, but never had an opportunity of doing more than be doubtful till just lately."

"Why didn't he speak out to a friend--say to a man like me?"

"Because, I'm telling you, it was only suspicion. Hallam managed the thing very artfully, and threw dust in Thickens's eyes; but last of all he see his way clear, and went and told parson. And just then Sir Gordon were suspicious, too, and had got something to go upon, and they nabbed my gentleman just as he was going away."

"And do you believe all this?" cried Gemp.

"To be sure I do. Don't you?"

"Tchah! I'm afraid they're all in it."

"Ah! well, I'm not; and, as we've nothing to lose, I don't care."

"How did Hallam look?"

"Very white; and, my word! he did give parson a look when he was called up to give his evidence. He looked black at Thickens and at Sir Gordon, but he seemed regularly savage with parson."

"Ah, to be sure!" cried Gemp. "What did I say about being thick with parson? It's my belief that if all had their deserts parson would be standing in the dock alongside o' Hallam."

"And it's my belief, Gemp, that you're about the silliest owd maulkin that ever stepped! There, I won't quarrel with thee. Parson? Pshaw!"

"Well, thou'lt see, mun, thou'lt see! Committed for trial, eh? And how about the other fellow!"

"What, Crellock? Oh, they've got him too. He came smelling after Hallam, who was like a decoy bird to him. Wanted to see him in the cage; and they let him see Hallam, and--"

"Ah, I heard that Hallam told the constable Crellock was worse than he, and they took him too. Yes, I heard that. Hallo! here comes Hallam's maid--doctor's owd lass, Thisbe. Let's get a word wi' her."

Gemp shuffled out of the tailor's shop, and made for Thisbe, who was coming down the street, with her head up and her nose in the air.

"Mornin', good mornin'," he said, with one of his most amiable grins.

"I didn't say it wasn't," said Thisbe sharply; and she went straight on to Miss Heathery's, knocked sharply, and waited, gazing defiantly about the place the while.

"Well, she's a stinger, she is!" muttered Gemp, standing scraping away at his face with his forefinger. "Do her good to be married, and hev some one with the rule over her. Humph! she's gone. Now what does she want there?"

The answer was very simple, though it was full of mystery to Gemp. Thisbe wanted her mistress and the child, who had gone to Miss Heathery's after dark, Millicent's soul revolting against the idea of staying at the old home now that it was in the possession of Christie Bayle, her husband's bitterest foe.

The gossips were quite correct. Hallam had been examined thrice before the county magistrates, and enough had been traced to prove that for a long time he had been speculating largely, losing, and making up his losses by pledging, at one particular bank, the valuable securities with which Dixons' strong-room was charged. When one of these was wanted he pledged another and redeemed it, while altogether the losses were so heavy that, had not the old bank proprietors been very wealthy men, Dixons' must have gone.

"Now, where's she a-going, neighbour?" said Gemp, scraping away at his stubbly face. "I don't feel up to it like I did, but I shall have to see."

Gorringe peered through his glasses and the window at the figure in black that had just left Miss Heathery's, leaning on Thisbe's arm for a few moments, and then, as if by an effort, drawing herself up and walking alone.

The day was lovely, the sky of the deepest blue; the sun seemed to be brightening every corner of the whole town, and making the flowers blink and brighten, and the sparrows that haunted the eaves to be in a state of the greatest excitement. King's Castor had never looked more quaintly picturesque and homelike, more the beau-ideal of an old English country town, from the coaching inn with yellow post-chaise outside, and the blue-jacketed postboy with his unnecessarily knotted whip, down to the vegetable stall at the corner of the market, where old Mrs Dims sat on an ancient rush-bottomed chair, with her feet in a brown earthenware bread-pancheon to keep them dry.

Mrs Pinet's flower-pots were so red that they seemed like the blossoms of her plants growing unnaturally beneath the leaves, and her window, and every one else's panes, shone and glittered with the true country brilliancy in the morning sun. Even the grass looked green growing between the cobble-stones--those pebbles that gave the town the aspect that, being essentially pastoral, the inhabitants had decided, out of compliment to their farm neighbours, to pave it with sheep's kidneys.

But there was one blot upon it--one ugly scar, where the yellow deal boards had been newly nailed up, and the walls and window-frames were blackened with smoke; and it was when passing these ruins of her home that Millicent Hallam first shuddered, and then drew herself up to walk firmly by.

"Ah!" said Gorringe, making his shears click, "you wouldn't feel happy if you didn't know what was going on, would you, neighbour?"

"Eh? Know? Of course not. If it hadn't been for me looking after the bank, where would you have all been, eh?"

Gemp spoke savagely, and pointed at the tailor as if he were going to bore a hole in his chest.

"Well, p'r'aps you did some good there, Master Gemp; but if you'd take my advice, you'd go home and keep yoursen quiet. I wouldn't get excited about nothing, if I was you."

"Humph! No, you wouldn't, Master Gorringe; but some folk is different to others," said Gemp, talking away from the doorway, with his head outside, as he peered down the street.

"Hey! look at 'em now!--the curiosity of these women folk! Here's owd Mother Pinet with her neck stretched out o' window, and Barton at the shop, and Cross at the `Chequers,' and Dawson the carrier, all got their heads out, staring after that woman. Now, where's she going, I wonder?"

Old Gemp stumped back into the shop, shaving away at his cheek.

"She can't be going over to Lindum to see Hallam, because she went yesterday."

The tailor's shears clicked as a corner was taken out of a piece of cloth.

"She ain't going up to the doctor's, because he drove by half-an-hour ago with the owd lady."

Another click.

"Can't be going for a walk. Wouldn't go for a walk at a time like this. I've often wondered why folk do go for walks, Master Gorringe. I never did."

_Click_!

"Nay, Master Gemp, you could always find enough to see and do in the town, eh?"

"Plenty! plenty, mun, plenty!--I've got it!"

"Eh?"

"She's going--Hallam's wife, yonder--to see owd Sir Gordon, and beg Hallam off; and, look here, I wean't hev it!"

Gemp banged his stick down upon the counter in a way that made the cloth spread thereon rise in waves, and became very broad of speech here, though it was a matter of pride amongst the Castor people that they spoke the purest English in the county, and were not broad of utterance, like the people on the wolds, and "down in the marsh."

VOLUME TWO, CHAPTER EIGHTEEN.

A PAINFUL MEETING.

Whether Gemp would have it or no, Millicent Hallam was on her way to Sir Gordon's quiet, old-fashioned house on the North Road--a house that was a bit of a mystery to the Castor children, whose young brains were full of conjecture as to what could be inside a place whose windows were blanks, and with nothing but a door to the road, and a high wall right and left to complete the blankness of the frontage.

It ought to have been called the backage; for Sir Gordon Bourne's house was very pleasant on the other side, with a compact garden and flowers blooming to brighten it--a garden in which he never walked.

Millicent Hallam pulled at the swinging handle of the bell at Sir Gordon's door with the determination of one who has called to demand a right.