looked up at the window of the room now,
there was no light in it. He crept cautiously
to the house-door. On going away, he
remembered to have closed it: on trying it
now, he found it open.

He waited outside, never losing sight of the
house, till daylight. Then he ventured
indoors—listened, and heard nothing—looked
into kitchen, scullery, parlour; and found
nothing: went up, at last, into the bedroom
—it was empty. A pick-lock lay on the
floor, betraying how she had gained entrance
in the night; and that was the only trace
of her.

Whither had she gone? That no mortal
tongue could tell him. The darkness had
covered her flight; and when the day broke,
no man could say where the light found her.

Before leaving the house and the town for
ever, he gave instructions to a friend and
neighbour to sell his furniture for anything
that it would fetch, and apply the proceeds
to employing the police to trace her. The
directions were honestly followed, and the
money was all spent; but the enquiries led
to nothing. The pick-lock on the bedroom
floor remained the one last useless trace of
her.

At this point of the narrative the landlord
paused, and looked towards the stable-door.

"So far," he said, " I tell you what was
told to me. The little that remains to be
added lies within my own experience.
between two and three months after the events
I have just been relating, Isaac Scatchard
came to me, withered and old-looking before
his time, just as you saw him to-day. He
had his testimonials to character with him,
and he asked for employment here. I gave
him a trial, and liked him in spite of his queer
habits. He is as sober, honest, and willing a
man as there is in England. As for his
restlessness at night, and his sleeping away his
leisure time in the day, who can wonder at
it after hearing his story? Besides, he never
objects to being roused up, when he's wanted,
so there's not much inconvenience to
complain of, after all."

"I suppose he is afraid of waking out of
that dreadful dream in the dark? " said I.

"No," returned the landlord. " The dream
comes back to him so often, that he has got
to bear with it by this time resignedly
enough. It's his wife keeps him waking at
night, as he has often told me."

"What! Has she never been heard of
yet?"

"Never. Isaac himself has the one
perpetual thought about her, that she is alive
and looking for him. I believe he wouldn't
let himself drop off to sleep towards two
in the morning for a king's ransom. Two
in the morning, he says, is the time when
she will find him, one of these days. Two in
the morning is the time all the year round,
when he likes to be most certain that he has
got that clasp-knife safe about him. He
does not mind being alone, as long as he is
awake, except on the night before his birth-
day, when he firmly believes himself to be
in peril of his life. The birthday has only
come round once since he has been here;
and then he sat up, along with the night-
porter. ' She's looking for me,' he always
says, when I speak to him on the one theme
of his life; ' she's looking for me.' He may
be right. She may be looking for him. Who
can tell?"

"Who can tell!" said I.

THE BOOTS.

WHERE had he been in his time? he
repeated when I asked him the question. Lord,
he had been everywhere! And what had he
been? Bless you, he had been everything
you could mention a'most.

Seen a good deal? Why, of course he had.
I should say so, he could assure me, if I only
knew about a twentieth part of what had
come in his way. Why, it would be easier
for him, he expected, to tell what he hadn't
seen, than what he had. Ah! A deal, it
would.

What was the curiousest thing he had
seen? Well! He didn't know. He couldn't
momently name what was the curiousest thing
he had seen—unless it was a Unicorn—and
he see him once, at a Fair. But, supposing a
young gentleman not eight year old, was to
run away with a fine young woman of seven,
might I think that a queer start? Certainly?
Then, that was a start as he himself had had
his blessed eyes on—and he had cleaned
the shoes they run away in—and they was
so little that he couldn't get his hand
into 'em.

Master Harry Walmers's father, you see,
he lived at the Elmses, down away by Shooter's
Hill there, six or seven mile from Lunnon.
He was a gentleman of spirit, and good looking,
and held his head up when he walked, and
had what you may call Fire about him. He
wrote poetry, and he rode, and he ran, and he
cricketed, and he danced, and he acted, and
he done it all equally beautiful. He was
uncommon proud of Master Harry as was
his only child; but he didn't spoil him,
neither. He was a gentleman that had a
will of his own and a eye of his own, and
that would be minded. Consequently, though
he made quite a companion of the fine bright
boy, and was delighted to see him so fond of
reading his fairy books, and was never tired
of hearing him say my name is Norval, or
hearing him sing his songs about Young May
Moons is beaming love, and When he as adores
thee has left but the name, and that: still he
kept the command over the child, and the
child was a child, and it's to be wished more
of 'em was!

How did Boots happen to know all this?
Why, through being under-gardener. Of