"Pair horse fly to Silverton: take up in Mill-
street at eight o'clock. Is that it, sir?" Sampson
assented; but Edward told her the ostler
said it was Silverton station.

"No: it is Silverton in the book, sir. "Well,
you see it is all one to us; the station is further
than the town, but we charge seven miles
whichever 'tis."

Bradshaw, inspected then and there, sought
in vain to conceal that four trains reached
Silverton from different points between 8.50 and
9.25, A.M.

The friends retired with this scanty
information; Alfred could hardly have gone to
London: for there was a train up from
Barkington itself at 8.30. But he might have gone
to almost any other part of the island, or out of
it for that matter. Sampson fell into a brown study.

After a long silence, which Edward was too
sad to break, he said thoughtfully: "Bring
science to bear on this hotch potch. Facks are
never really opposed to facks; they onnly seem
to be: and the true solution is the one which
riconciles all the facks: f'r instance the
chronothairmal Therey riconciles all th' undisputed
facks in midicine. So now sairch for a solution
to riconcile the Deed with the puppy
levanting."

Edward searched, but could find none; and
said so.

"Can't you?" said Sampson; "then I'll give
you a couple. Say he is touched in the upper
story, for one."

"What do you mean? mad?"

"Oh: there are degrees of Phrinzy. Here is
th' inconsistency of conduct that marks a
disturbance of the reason: and, to tell the truth, I
once knew a young fellow that played this very
prank at a wedding, and, the nixt thing we hard,
my lorrd was in Bedlam."

Edward shook his head: "It is the villain's
heart, not his brain."

Sampson then offered another solution, in
which he owned he had more confidence:

"He has been courting some other wumman
first: she declined, or made believe; but, when
she found he had the spirit to go and marry an
innocent girl, then the jade wrote to him and
yielded. It's a married one, likely. I've known
women go further for hatred of a wumman than
they would for love of a man: and here was a
temptation! to snap a lover off th' altar, and
insult a rival, all at one blow. He meant to
marry; he meant to sign that deed: ay and, at
his age, even if he had signed it, he would have
gone off at passion's call, and beggared himself.
What enrages me is that we didn't let him sign
it, and so nail the young rascal's money."

"Curse his money," said Edward, " and him
too. Wait till I can lay my hand on him; I'll
break every bone in his skin."

"And I'll help you."

In the morning, Mrs. Dodd left Julia for a
few minutes expressly to ask Sampson's advice.
After Alfred's conduct she was free, and fully
determined, to defend herself and family against
spoliation by any means in her power; so she
now showed the doctor David's letter about the
14,000l.; and the empty pocket-book; and put
together the disjointed evidence of Julia, Alfred,
and circumstances, in one neat and luminous
statement: Sampson was greatly struck with the
revelation: he jumped off his chair and marched
about excited; said truth was stranger than
fiction, and this was a manifest swindle: then he
surprised Mrs. Dodd in her turn by assuming
that old Hardie was at the bottom of yesterday's
business. Neither Edward nor his mother could
see that, and said so: his reply was characteristic:
"Of course you can't; you are Anglosaxins;
th' Anglosaxins are good at drawing
distinctions; but they can't gineralise. I'm a
Celt, and gineralise— as a duck swims. I
discovered th' unity of all disease: it would be odd
if I could not trace the maniform iniquities you suffer
to their one source."

"But what is the connecting link?" asked
Mrs. Dodd, still incredulous.

"Why, Richard Hardie's interest."

"Well, but the letter?" objected Edward.

"There goes th' Anglosaxin again,"
remonstrated Sampson: " puzzling his head over petty
details; and they are perhaps mere blinds thrown
out by th' enemy. Put this and that together:
Hardie senior always averse to this marriage;
Hardie senior wanting to keep £14,000 of yours:
if his son, who knows of the fraud, became
your mother's son, the swindle would be hourly
in danger (no connexion? y' unhappy
Anglosaxins; why the two things are interwoven).
And so young Hardie is got out of the way:
old Hardie's doing, or I'm a Dutchman."

This reasoning still appeared forced and
fanciful to Edward; but it began to make some
little impression on Mrs. Dodd, and encouraged
her to own that her poor daughter suspected foul
play.

"Well, that is possible too; whativer tempted
man has done, tempted man will do: but more
likely he has bribed Jezebel to write and catch
the goose by the heart. Gintlemen, I'm a bit
of a physiognomist: look at old Hardie's lines;
his cordage I might say; and deeper every time
I see him; sirs, I've an eye like a hawk. There's
an awful weight on that man's mind. Looksee!
I'll just send a small trifle of a detective down
to watch his game, and pump his people: and,
as soon as it is safe, we'll seize the old bird, and,
once he is trapped, the young one will reappear
like magic: th' old one will disgorge; we'll just
compound the felony— been an old friend— and
recover the cash."

A fine sketch; but Edward thought it
desperately wild, and Mrs. Dodd preferred
employing a respectable attorney to try and obtain
justice in the regular way. Sampson laughed
at her; what was the use of attacking in the
regular way an irregular genius like old Hardie?
" Attorneys are too humdrum for such a job,"
said he; " they start with a civil letter putting
a rogue on his guard; they proceed t' a writ,
and then he digs a hole in another county
and buries the booty; or sails t' Australia with it.