be, a blow on the cheek as he spoke, with his
soiled gauntlet. Sportively, I hope, but rudely
enough to bring a flush to the pale cheek,
and a clench to the palsied hand, that, twenty
years ago, would have been as good as a
knock down blow to the ruffian soldado.

"Look you here, Master Teazle and Wool,"
he went on, gripping the retired cloth-merchant
by the arm. "You are hand and glove with
this Babylon baron's daughter; you mumble
out of the same mass-book, and plot against
His sacred Majesty together. Now mark!
go you up, and tell my lady this,—she expects
her son to-night. Don't lie, old Judas, and
say she doesn't. In this pocket," and the
captain slapped his thigh, "I have the
proclamation for the taking of Gervase Gabion
of Gabion, dead or alive, with two hundred
pounds reward. I come to Gabion Place
to-night. Either I go away the accepted
suitor and affianced husband of my Lady
Gabion, or I come away, to-morrow morning,
with a serjeant and a squad behind me. I'll
ride my horse Turenne, d'ye hear; but I'll
have the bridle of another horse in my hand,
and on that horse shall be her dainty master
Gervase Gabion, gagged, handcuffed, and with
his legs tied underneath the horse's belly."

"Captain, captain!" faltered Paul.

"Tell her that!" concluded the captain
triumphantly, snapping the fingers of the
soiled gauntlet. "Tell her that her pet boy
shall swing at Carlisle within a fortnight;
that he shall be hanged, drawn, and quartered
according to law, like a traitor as he is.
Tell her that, and that I'll marry her
afterwards into the bargain, if she isn't civil."

And with these words swaggered away,
with much jingling of spurs and clanging of
the sabre, Captain Jesse Seagreest of
Morrishes regiment of horse. He was as great a
bully, ruffian, and gamester, as ever was
permitted, in those somewhat free and easy
Horse Guard days, to disgrace His Majesty's
service.

The cloth-merchant hurried away as fast
as his tottering limbs would permit him, in
the direction of Gabion Place. He was
panting and trembling with exhaustion and
excitement when he reached the quaint iron
gate, which gave entrance by a sinuous
carriage drive to the picturesque old mansion.
The old porter was not so deaf and stupid,
but he sufficiently comprehended the importance
of the occasion when Mr. Paul pencilled
hastily on one of his tablets a passionate
request to the Lady Gabion, to let him
have one minute's interview with her. Simon
Candy, the lodge-keeper, was as devout a
Catholic, and as staunch a vassal of the houses
of Stuart and Gabion as can well be imagined,
and he had no sooner read the words held
before his eyes by the hand of the
cloth-merchant, than, with a nod of acquiescence,
he admitted him within the gate, and bidding
him wait an instant before the lodge door,
hurried away towards the house.

He returned almost immediately.

"My lady'll see thee," he said. "Gang
thee ways oup yander, lad: thee know'st
t' way." The lad of eighty,, having indicated
to the lad of seventy the route he was to
take, retired into his lodge.

Slowly and sadly—a contrast to the hurried
eagerness with which he had approached the
house—the ancient man proceeded upon his
mission. Now that he was so near upon its
completion an accountable reluctance seemed
to take possession of him in unfolding its
purpose. He trod laggingly through a trim,
prim, square-cut garden, arranged in that
Helvetico-Italian style of which Lenôtre was
the inventor and prime professor. By
hedges cropped like horsehair cushions,
through quaint triumphal arches of herbage,
under trees cut into fantastic shapes, by
zig-zag flower-pots he went, the gravel
rasping discordantly under his feet, the
leaves of the evergreens soughing piteously.
So, on till he came to a glass grapehouse,
where was a large grapevine, near which, in a
rustic chair, was a lady of a noble presence,
with pale face and great brown eyes, a white
hand, a supple yet commanding form, and
fair hair. Nigh forty years had passed their
hands across her features, but they had dealt
with her lightly, and had left few scars
behind. If her face had not been so deathly
pale, and her eyes so sorrowful, she would
have been beautiful.

The cloth-merchant was a plain man, and
told what he had to say as plainly and
succinctly as he could. "Dear lady," he
said, in conclusion, "if what this murthering
trooper says be true, tell us at least if he has
reason for his suspicion. Let us see what we
can do to hide the truth, to save our boy.
There is not a soul in Bridgemoor, I will be
sworn, but would go through fire and water
to serve you—the swashbuckling dragoons
excepted. Joe Limberup (the captain) is in
the commission of the peace. He might help
us."

For reply she took him by the hand, and
pulled him rather than led him into a little
shed, outside where the gardener kept his tools.
She closed the ricketty door, she hung her
mantle over the latch, she looked around so
scared and bewildered, as if she feared the
sparrows on the window-sill would carry her
secret; then, pulling from her bosom a torn,
dirty, crumpled piece of paper, she thrust it
into the old man's hand, and bade him
read it.

It was a letter from her son, Gervase
Gabion. It said that he was in prison, and
in peril of his life; but that he had planned
an escape. He indicated three days, Tuesday,
Wednesday, and Thursday in this same week,
on which he might come disguised to Gabion.
If he did not come on the third day he was to
be considered dead. There was neither place
nor date to the hurried scrawl which was as
a life or death warrant to two human beings;