hope he will not put himself into the danger; but
if he does——" She paused, and looked thoughtfully
into her husband's face, while a quick
shudder crept over her. He saw the look in
her eyes, he felt the quiver in her hand, and
frowned darkly.

"Don't take to melodrama, Harriet, it's so
unlike you, and doesn't suit you. Besides, it's
too late in the day for that kind of thing now."

She took no notice of the ungracious speech,
but still stood looking thoughtfully at him. He
rose, letting her hand drop from his shoulder,
and walked up and down the room.

"Stewart," she said, gently, "you must not be
impatient with me if I am not as ready of
resource as I was. However, I think I see what
ought to be done in this emergency, and I am
quite sure I can do it. I will go to Amherst,
find out the true state of things there, see the
old woman at Poynings, who will gladly receive
me as a friend of George Dallas, and then, and
then only, can we decide whether this letter is
to reach him or not."

"By Jove! Harry, that's a splendid idea,"
said Routh, "and there can't be any risk in it, for
Dallas would take your doing it as the greatest
kindness. You not so ready of resource as you
were? You're more so, my girl—you're more so."

There was a little wonder in the look she
turned upon him, a little surprise at the lightness
of his tone, but not a ray of the pleasure
which his perverted praise had once given her.

"This is the best thing to do," she said,
gravely, "and I will do it at once. I will go
tomorrow morning."

"And I will get our traps moved, and put
up at the Tavistock till you come back. You
can pack this evening, I suppose, Harry?"

"Oh yes," she answered. "I shall be glad
of the occupation."

"And you'll do it more easily without me,"
said Routh, whom no crisis of events, however
serious, could render indifferent to his individual
comforts, and to whom the confusion of packing
was an image of horror and disgust, "so I
shall dine out, and leave you to your own devices.
Here, you had better lock these up." He took
the letters from a table on which she had laid
them as she spoke, and held them towards her.

She drew a step nearer to him, took the
papers from his hand, then suddenly let them
drop upon the floor, and flung her arms wildly
round Routh' s neck.

"Harriet, Harriet," he said, "what's this?"
as he strove to lift her face, which she held
pressed against his breast with terrible force.
She answered him with a groan—a groan so full
of anguish, that his callousness was not proof
against it.

"My love, my darling, my brave girl, don't,
don't!" was all he could say, as he bent his head
over her, and held her tightly to him. For
several moments she stood thus; then she lifted
her white face, put up her hands and drew his
face down to hers, kissed him with kisses which
thrilled him with an unknown sense of fear and
doom, and instantly releasing, left him.

Mr. James Swain got the promised odd job
in South Molton-street sooner than he had
expected it, for calling at No. 60, according to
Mr. Routh's instructions, to ask the lady when
his services would be required, he was informed
that she had gone away, and he was to carry
down the boxes to be conveyed to their destination
in the van then standing at the door. Jim
performed his duty with a perturbed spirit.

"Gone away, is she?" he said, over and over
again. "Now I should like to know where she's
gone, and wot for. I hope he ain't be up to
nothin' agin her, but I don't trust him, and I
ain't a goin' to lose sight of him for longer than
I can help, if I knows it, until she's safe back
somewheres."

"That funeral is largely attended for a small
town," said Harriet Routh to the waiter at the
inn at Amherst, who was laying the cloth for her
dinner. She was sitting by a window on the
ground floor, and idly watching the decorous
procession as it passed along the main street, to
the huge admiration of gaping boys and
gossiping nursemaids.

"Yes, ma'am," replied the man, gladly
seizing the opportunity of approaching the
window, and having a peep on his own
account.

"He was very much respected, was old Mr.
Evans; no one in the town more so. He gave
the best of measures, and used the best of
mater'als, and a charitabler man, nor a
constanter at meetin', though uncommon deaf
latterly, ain't in Amherst."

Harriet looked inquiringly at the speaker.

"I beg your pardon, ma'am, you're a stranger,
of course, and don't know nothin' about poor
old Evans. He were a tailor, ma'am, at
Amherst, man and boy, for fifty year and more,
and got a deal of custom, which they do say no
tailor here won't have for the future, seein' as
they can't compete with the Sydenham suits."

Harriet made no comment upon the man's
little discourse, and he left the room. When
she was alone, she smiled a smile not good to
see, and said, half aloud:

"I remember how they used to talk about
Providence, and providential interventions on
behalf of the good, long ago, when I used to
fancy I believed in Providence, and when I
certainly did believe in the existence of the
good. I wonder what these people would call
this? If it is a providential intervention, the
theory has two sides."

CHAPTER VIII. ON THE DEFENSIVE.

THE announcement of a lady who wished to
see Mrs. Brookes caused the faithful old woman
no particular emotion. She was well known
and much respected among the neighbours of
Poynings, in the humbler sense, and visits from
several of their number were ordinary events
enough in her life. The announcement found
her, not in her own room, but in her mistress's,
where she had replaced the portrait of George,
and was sitting looking at it with dim eyes and