night; and presently Mrs. Dodd came and tapped
softly at her son's door, and found him with his
vest and coat off, and his helmet standing on the
table reflecting a red coal; he was seated by the
fire in a brown study, smoking. He apologised,
and offered to throw the weed away. "No, no,"
said she, suppressing a cough, "not if it does
you good."

"Well, mother, when you are in a fix smoke
is a soother, you know; and I'm in a regular
fix."

"A fix!" sighed Mrs. Dodd resignedly: and
waited patiently, all ears.

"Mamma," said the fire-warrior, becoming
speculative under the dreamy influence of the
weed, "I wonder whether such a muddle ever
was before. When a man is fighting with fire,
what with the heat, and what with the excitement,
his pulse is at a hundred and sixty, and
his brain all in a whirl, and he scarce knows
what he is doing till after it is done. But I've
been thinking of it all since. (Puff.) There was
my poor little mamma in the mob; I double
myself up for my spring, and I go at the window,
and through it; now on this side of it I hear my
mother cry 'Edward! come down;' on the other
side I fall on two men perishing in an oven;
one is my own father, and the other is, who do
you think? 'The Wretch.'"

Mrs. Dodd held up her hands in mute amazement.

"I had promised to break every bone in his
skin at our first meeting; and I kept my promise
by saving his skin and bones, and life and all."
(Puff.)

Mrs. Dodd groaned aloud. "I half suspected
it," she said faintly. "That tall figure, that
haughty grace! But no; you are mistaken;
Mrs. Archbold told me positively he was an attendant."

"Then she told you a cracker. It was not an
attendant, but a madman, and that madman was
Alfred Hardie, upon my soul! Our Julia's
missing bridegroom."

He smoked on in profound silence waiting for
her to speak. But she lay back in her chair mute
and all relaxed, as if the news had knocked her
down.

"Come, now," said Edward at last; "what is
to be done? May I tell Julia? that is the question."

"Not for the world," said Mrs. Dodd, shocked
into energy. "Would you blight her young life
for ever as mine is blighted?" She then assured
him that, if Alfred's sad state came to Julia's
ears, all her love for him would revive, and she
would break with Mr. Hurd, and indeed never
marry all her life. "I see no end to her misery,"
continued Mrs. Dodd, with a deep sigh; "for
she is full of courage; she would not shrink
from a madhouse (why she visits lazar houses
every day); she would be always going to see
her Alfred, and so nurse her pity and her unhappy
love. No, no; let me be a widow with a living
husband, if it is God's will: I have had my happy
days. But my child she shall not be so withered
in the flower of her days for any man that ever
breathed: she shall not, I say." The mother
could utter no more for emotion.

"Well," said Edward, "you know best. I
generally make a mess of it when I disobey you.
But concealments are bad things too. We used
to go with our bosoms open. Ah!" (Puff.)

"Edward," said Mrs. Dodd, after some
consideration, "the best thing is to marry her to
Mr. Hurd at once. He has spoken to me for
her, and I sounded her."

"Has he? Well, and what did she say?"

"She said she would rather not marry at all,
but live and die with me. Then I pressed her a
little, you know. Then she did say she could
never marry any but a clergyman, now she had
lost her poor Alfred. And then I told her I
thought Mr. Hurd could make her happy, and
she would make me happy if she could esteem
him; and marry him."

"Well, mamma, and what then?"

"Why then my poor child gave me a look
that haunts me still—a look of unutterable love,
and reproach, and resignation, and despair, and
burst out crying so piteously I could say no
more. Oh! oh! oh! oh!"

"Don't you cry, mammy dear," said Edward.
"Ah, I remember when a tear was a wonder in
our house." And the fire-warrior sucked at his
cigar, to stop a sigh.

"And n—now n—not a d—day without
them," sighed Mrs. Dodd. "But you have cost
me none, my precious boy."

"I'm waiting my time. (Puff.) Mamma, take
my advice; don't you fidget so. Let things alone.
Why hurry her into marrying Mr. Hurd or
anybody? Look here; I'll keep dark to please you,
if you'll keep quiet to please me."

At breakfast time came a messenger with a
line from Mrs. Archbold, to say that David had
escaped from Drayton House, in company with
another dangerous maniac.

Mrs. Dodd received the blow with a kind of
desperate resignation. She rose quietly from
the table without a word, and went to put on
her bonnet, leaving her breakfast and the note;
for she did not at once see all that was implied
in the communication. She took Edward with
her to Drayton House. The firemen had saved
one half of that building: the rest was a black
shell. Mrs. Archbold came to them, looking
haggard, and told them two keepers were already
scouring the country, and an advertisement sent
to all the journals.

"Oh, madam!" said Mrs. Dodd, "if the other
should hurt him, or lead him somewhere to his
death?"

Mrs. Archbold said she might dismiss this
fear; the patient in question had but one illusion,
and, though terribly dangerous when thwarted
in that, was most intelligent in a general way,
and much attached to Mr. Dodd; they were
always together.