price on her recovery—which published the
description of her in pitiless print, like the
description of a strayed dog. No tender
consideration had prepared her for the shock, no
kind words softened it to her when it came. The
vagabond whose cunning eyes watched her
eagerly while she read, knew no more that the
handbill which he had stolen, had only been
prepared in anticipation of the worst, and was
only to be publicly used in the event of all more
considerate means of tracing her being tried in
vain—than she knew it. The bill dropped from
her hand; her face flushed deeply. She turned
away from Captain Wragge, as if all idea of his
existence had passed out of her mind.

"Oh, Norah, Norah!" she said to herself,
sorrowfully. "After the letter I wrote you—
after the hard struggle I had to go away! Oh,
Norah! Norah!"

"How is Norah?" inquired the captain, with
the utmost politeness.

She turned upon him with an angry brightness
in her large grey eyes. "Is this thing shown
publicly?" she asked, stamping her foot on it. "Is
the mark on my neck described all over York?"

"Pray compose yourself," pleaded the
persuasive Wragge. "At present I have every reason
to believe that you have just perused the only
copy in circulation. Allow me to pick it up."

Before he could touch the bill, she snatched it
from the pavement, tore it into fragments, and
threw them over the wall.

"Bravo!" cried the captain. "You remind me
of your poor dear mother. The family spirit,
Miss Vanstone. We all inherit our hot blood
from my maternal grandfather."

"How did you come by it?" she asked,
suddenly.

"My dear creature, I have just told you,"
remonstrated the captain. "We all come by it from
my maternal grandfather."

"How did you come by that handbill?" she
repeated, passionately.

"I beg ten thousand pardons! My head was
running on the family spirit.—How did I come
by it? Briefly thus." Here Captain Wragge
entered on his personal statement; taking his
customary vocal exercise through the longest
words in the English language, with the highest
elocutionary relish. Having on this rare occasion
nothing to gain by concealment, he departed
from his ordinary habits; and with the utmost
amazement at the novelty of his own situation,
permitted himself to tell the unmitigated truth.

The effect of the narrative on Magdalen by no
means fulfilled Captain Wragge's anticipations
in relating it. She was not startled; she was not
irritated; she showed no disposition to cast
herself on his mercy, and to seek his advice. She
looked him steadily in the face; and all she said
when he had neatly rounded his last sentence,
was—"Go on."

"Go on?" repeated the captain. "Shocked
to disappoint you, I am sure—but, the fact is, I
have done."

"No you have not," she rejoined; "you have
left out the end of your story. The end of it is:—
You came here to look for me; and you mean to
earn the fifty pounds reward."

Those plain words so completely staggered
Captain Wragge, that for the moment he stood
speechless. But he had faced awkward truths of
all sorts far too often to be permanently disconcerted
by them. Before Magdalen could pursue
her advantage, the vagabond had recovered his
balance: Wragge was himself again.

"Smart," said the captain, laughing
indulgently, and drumming with his umbrella on
the pavement. "Some men might take it
seriously. I'm not easily offended. Try again."

Magdalen looked at him through the gathering
darkness, in mute perplexity. All her little
experience of society, had been experience among
people who possessed a common sense of honour,
and a common responsibility of social position.
She had hitherto seen nothing but the successful
human product from the great manufactory of
Civilisation. Here was one of the failures—and,
with all her quickness, she was puzzled how to
deal with it.

"Pardon me for returning to the subject,"
pursued the captain. "It has just occurred to
my mind that you might actually have spoken in
earnest. My poor child! how can I earn the
fifty pounds before the reward is offered to me?
Those handbills may not be publicly posted for
a week to come. Precious as you are to all your
relatives (myself included), take my word for it,
the lawyers who are managing this case will
not pay fifty pounds for you if they can
possibly help it. Are you still persuaded that my
needy pockets are gaping for the money? Very
good. Button them up, in spite of me, with
your own fair fingers. There is a train to London
at nine-forty-five to-night. Submit yourself to
your friend's wishes; and go back by it."

"Never!" said Magdalen, firing at the bare
suggestion, exactly as the captain had intended
she should. "If my mind had not been made up
before, that vile handbill would have decided
me. I forgive Norah," she added, turning away,
and speaking to herself, "but not Mr. Pendril,
and not Miss Garth."

"Quite right!" observed Captain Wragge.
"The family spirit. I should have done the same
myself at your age: it runs in the blood. Hark!
there goes the clock again—half-past seven.
Miss Vanstone! pardon this seasonable abruptness.
If you are to carry out your resolution—
if you are to be your own mistress much longer,
you must take a course of some kind before
eight o'clock. You are young, you are
inexperienced, you are in imminent danger. Here is
a position of emergency on one side—and here
am I, on the other, with an uncle's interest in
you, full of advice. Tap me."

"Suppose I choose to depend on nobody, and
to act for myself?" said Magdalen. "What
then?"

"Then," replied the captain, "you will