The gray light become intermingled with red, and soon the sky to the east was aflame. Paul let down the carriage window, and long waves of sweet mountain air, laden with the smell of peat, flowed in upon him. His lips parted and his breast expanded. At five o'clock the engine was attached. A few carriages were added at the platform, and these contained a number of pitmen, in their red-stained fustian, going down for the morning shift. When the train moved westward, the sun had risen, and all the air was musical with the songs of the birds. Very soon the train ran in among the mountains, and then at last the bitterness of Paul Ritson's heart seemed to fall away from him like a garment. That quick thrill of soul which comes when the mountains are first seen after a long absence is a rapture known to the mountaineer alone. Paul saw his native hills towering up to the sky, the white mists flying off their bald crown, the torrents leaping down their brant sides, and the tears filled his eyes and blotted it all out. The sedge-warbler was singing with the wheatear, and, though he could not see them now, he knew where they were: the sedge-warbler was flitting among the rushes of the low-land mere; the wheatear was perched on the crevice of gray rock in which it had laid its pale-blue eggs; the sheep were bleating on the fells, and he knew their haunts by the lea of the bowlders and along the rocky ledges where grew the freshest grasses. Down the corries of Blencathra, long drifts of sheep were coming before the dogs, and he knew that the shepherds had been out on the fells during the short summer night, numbering the sheep for the washing in the beck below.

Everything came back upon him like a memory of yesterday. He stood up and thrust out his head, and did not think of his gray jacket and blue cap until a carter who watered his horses at a pool near the railway lines started and stared as if he had seen a "boggle" at noonday.

Then Paul Ritson remembered that he was still a convict, that his hands wore irons, that the man who lay sleeping on the seat of the carriage was his warder, and that the steely thing that peeped from the belt of the sleeping man was a revolver, to be promptly used if he attempted to escape.

But not even these reflections sufficed to dissipate the emotion that had taken hold of him. He began at length to think of Hugh Ritson, and to wonder why he had been brought back home. Home!—home? It was a melancholy home-coming, but it was coming home, nevertheless.



CHAPTER XVI.

Two days later the gray old town-hall that stands in the market-place of Keswick was surrounded by a busy throng. The Civil Court of the County Assize was sitting in this little place for the nonce to try a curious case of local interest. It was an action for ejectment brought by Greta, Mrs. Paul Ritson, against a defendant whose name was entered on the sheet as Paul Drayton, alias Paul Ritson, now of the Ghyll, in the Parish of Newlands.

The court-room was crowded. It was a large, bare room, with a long table and two rows of chairs crossing the end, the one row occupied by the judge and a special jury, the other by the lawyers for the prosecution and defense. The rest of the chamber was not provided with seats, and there the dalespeople huddled together.

A seat had been found for Greta at one end of the table. Her cheek rested on her hand. She dropped her eyes as the spectators craned their necks to catch a glimpse of her. Behind her, and with one hand on her chair-back, stood the old parson, his Jovian white head more white than of old, the tenderer lines in his mellow face drawn down to a look of pain. Immediately facing Greta, at the opposite end of the table, Hugh Ritson sat. One leg was thrown over the other knee, and the long, nervous fingers of the right hand played with the shoelace. His head was inclined forward, and the thin, pallid, clean-cut face with the great calm eyes and the full, dilated nostrils was more than ever the face of a high-bred horse. None would have guessed the purpose with which Hugh Ritson sat there. One would have said that indifference was in those eyes and on that brow—indifference or despair.

Near where the rustle was loudest and most frequent among the spectators, Drayton sat by the side of Mr. Bonnithorne. He was dressed in his favorite suit of broad plaid, and had a gigantic orange-lily stuck jauntily in his buttonhole. His face was flushed and his eyes sparkled. Now and again he leaned back to whisper something to the blacksmith, the miller, and the landlord of the Flying Horse, who were grouped behind him. His remarks must have been wondrously facetious, for they were promptly followed by a low gurgle, which was as promptly suppressed.

The counsel for the plaintiff opened his case. The plaintiff sued as the owner in succession to her husband, who was at present dead to the law. She contended that the man who now stood seized of the Ghyll was not her husband, Paul Ritson, but Paul Drayton, an innkeeper of Hendon, who bore him a strange personal resemblance, and personated him. The evidence of identity which should presently be adduced was full and complete in the essential particular of proving that the defendant was not Paul Ritson, by whose title alone the defense would maintain the right of present possession. Unhappily, the complementary evidence as to the actual identity of the defendant with Paul Drayton, the publican, had been seriously curtailed by the blindness, followed by the death, of an important witness. Still, if he, the counsel for the plaintiff, could prove to the satisfaction of the jury that the defendant was not the man he represented himself to be, they would have no course but to grant the ejectment for which the plaintiff asked. To this end he would call two witnesses whose evidence must outweigh that of all others—the wife of Paul Ritson, and the clergyman who solemnized the marriage.

Greta's name was called, and she rose at the end of the table. Her bosom heaved under the small lace shawl that covered her shoulders, and was knotted like a sailor's scarf, on her breast. She stood erect, her eyes raised slightly and her drooping hands clasped in front. After the customary formalities, she was examined.

"You are the only child of the late Robert Lowther?"

"I am the daughter of Robert Lowther."

Drayton threw back his head, and laughed a little.

"You were married to Paul Ritson in 1875 at the parish church of Newlands, the minister being the Reverend Mr. Christian?"

"I was."

"On the day of your marriage you accompanied your husband to London, and the same night he left you at the Convent of St. Margaret, Westminster?"

"That is quite true."

There was a buzz of conversation in the court, accompanied by a whispered conference on the bench. Counsel paused to say that it was not a part of his purpose to trouble the court with an explanation of facts which were so extraordinary that they could only be credited on the oath of a person who, though present, would not be called. At this reference Hugh Ritson raised his languid eyes, and the examination proceeded.

"Three days afterward you received a message from your husband, requesting you to meet him at St. Pancras Station, and return with him to Cumberland by the midnight train?"

"I did."

"Who took you the message?"

"Mrs. Drayton, the old person at the inn at Hendon."

"You went to the station?"

"Oh, yes."

"Tell the court what occurred there."

"Just on the stroke of twelve, when the train was about to leave, a man whom at first sight I mistook for my husband came hurrying up the platform, and I stepped into the carriage with him."

"Do you see that man in court?"

"Yes; he sits two seats to your right."

Drayton rose, smiled broadly, bowed to the witness, and resumed his seat.

"Were you alone in the compartment?"

"At first we were; but just as the train was moving away who should join us but Parson Christian."

There was another buzz of conversation, and counsel paused again to say that he should not trouble the court with an explanation of the extraordinary circumstances by which Parson Christian came to be in London at that critical moment. These facts formed in themselves a chain of evidence which must yet come before a criminal court, involving as it did the story of a conspiracy more painful and unnatural perhaps than could be found in the annals of jurisprudence.

"Tell the court what passed in the train."

"I perceived at once that the man was not my husband, though strangely like him in face and figure, and when he addressed me as his wife I repulsed him."

"Did Parson Christian also realize the mistake?"

"Oh, yes, but not quite so quickly."

"What did you do?"

"We left the train at the first station at which it stopped."

"Did the defendant offer any resistance?"

"No; he looked abashed, and merely observed that perhaps a recent illness had altered him."

Counsel for the defense, at whose left Mr. Bonnithorne sat as attorney for the defendant, cross-examined the witness.

"You say that on the night following the morning of your marriage your husband left you at a convent?"

"I do."

Mr. Bonnithorne dropped his twinkling eyes, and muttered something that was inaudible to the witness. There was a titter among the people who stood behind him.

"And you say that Mrs. Drayton took you the message of which you have spoken. Did she tell you that your husband had been ill?"

"She did."

"We are to infer that you visited the house of the Draytons at Hendon?"

"A railway accident drove us there."

"Did any one accompany the defendant to St. Pancras that night?"

"My husband's brother, Mr. Hugh Ritson, was with him."

"Tell the jury where your husband now is, if he is not at this moment in court."

No answer. Amid a profound silence the plaintiff's lawyer was understood to object to the question.

"Well, we can afford to waive it," said counsel, with a superior smile. "One further question, Mrs. Ritson. Had you any misunderstanding with your husband?"

"None whatever."

"Will you swear that your voices were not raised in angry dispute while you were at the inn at Hendon?"

Greta lifted her head and her eyes flashed. "Yes, I will swear it," she said in a soft voice but with impressive emphasis.

Mr. Bonnithorne reached up to the ear of counsel and was understood to say that perhaps the point was too delicate to be pressed.

Parson Christian was next examined. The defendant in the present action was not the man whom he married to the plaintiff. He had since seen Paul Ritson. Where? In the convict prison of Dartmoor. In cross-examination he was asked by what name the convict was known to the directors of Dartmoor. Paul Drayton.

"Then tell the court how you came to identify the defendant as Drayton."

"There were many facts pointing that way."

"Give us one."

"On the morning of the marriage I found a letter lying open before the fire in my vestry. It was from Mr. Hugh Ritson to Mr. Bonnithorne, and it mentioned the name of Drayton in a connection which, by the light of later revelations, provoked many inferences."

Mr. Bonnithorne was unprepared for this answer. Counsel looked at him inquiringly, but the attorney glanced down and colored deeply.

"Can you show us the letter?"

"No; I left it where I found it."

"Then it can hardly be received as evidence."

The attorney smiled, and the tension of Drayton's face relaxed. There was a slight shuffle among the people; the witness had stepped back.

Counsel for the defense opened his case. They were asked to believe that the defendant in the present action was Paul Drayton, in the teeth of the fact that Paul Drayton was at that moment a convict in a convict prison. The incredible statement was made that a newly married husband had placed his young wife in a convent on the night of their marriage, and that when they should have rejoined each other an interchange had been made, the husband going to prison in another man's name, the other man coming to Cumberland to claim the place of the woman's husband. Moreover, they were asked to believe that the husband's brother, Mr. Hugh Ritson, had either been fooled by the impostor or made a party to the imposture. Happily it was easy to establish identity by two unquestionable chains of evidence—resemblance and memory. It would be shown that the defendant could be none other than Paul Ritson, first, because he resembled him exactly in person; second, because he knew all that Paul Ritson ought to know; third, because he knew nothing that Paul Ritson might not know. No two men's lives had ever been the same from the beginning of the world, and as it would be seen that the defendant's life had been the same as Paul Ritson's, it followed that Paul Ritson and the defendant were one and the same man.

Dick o' the Syke was the first witness examined for the defense. He swore that Paul Ritson was active in extinguishing a fire that broke out in the mill two years ago; that he had climbed to the cross-trees with a hatchet; and that within the past month the defendant had described to him the precise locality and shape of the gap made in the roof by the fire. No one could have known so much except himself and the man who stood on the cross-trees. That man was Paul Ritson, and he was there and then recognized by many spectators, among whom was Parson Christian.

The next witness was Mistress Calvert, of the Pack Horse. Paul Ritson had slept at their house one night two years ago, and a few days since the present defendant had pointed out the bedroom he occupied, and recalled the few words of conversation which passed between them.

Natt, the stableman, was called. His sleepy eyes blinked knowingly as he explained that one winter's night, when the snow fell heavily, Mrs. Ritson, then Miss Greta, was startled by what she mistook for the ghost of Paul Ritson. The witness had not been so easily deceived, and the defendant had since described to him the exact scene and circumstances of what the lady had thought to be the ghostly appearance.

Then followed John Proudfoot, the blacksmith; Tom o' Dint, the postman; Giles Raisley, the pitman; Job Sheepshanks, the mason; and Tommy Lowthwaite, the landlord of the Flying Horse—all swearing to points of identity.

One recalled the fact that Paul Ritson had a scar on his head that was caused by the kick of a horse when he was a boy. The defendant had just such a scar.

Another remembered that Paul Ritson had a mark on the sole of his right foot which had been made by treading on a sharp piece of rock on Hindscarth. The defendant had exactly such a mark.

A third had wrestled with Paul Ritson, and knew that he had a mole beneath the left shoulder-blade on the back. The defendant had a mole in that unusual place.

Counsel for the defense smiled blandly at the special jury, the special jury smiled blandly at counsel for the defense. Was it really necessary that the defendant should be called? Surely it was a pity to occupy the time of the court. The whole case was in a nutshell—the lady had quarreled with her husband. State of affairs would be promptly gauged when it was explained that this action had been raised to anticipate a forthcoming suit in the divorce court for restitution of connubial rights.

The counsel for the plaintiff smiled also, and his was a weak smile of conscious defeat. He stammered a desire to withdraw—said he had been promised more conclusive evidence when he undertook the case, and sat down with an apologetic air.

There was a shuffle of feet in the court. Drayton had risen to receive the congratulations of his friends behind him and the cordial nods of some of the superior people who had been favored with seats at the right hand and left of the judge. He was answering in a loud tone, when there was a sudden lull of the buzz of gossip, and all eyes were directed toward one end of the table.

Hugh Ritson had risen from his seat, and with a face that was very pale, but as firm as a rock, he was engaged in a whispered conference with the plaintiff's counsel. That gentleman's eager face betrayed the keenest possible interest in what he heard. Presently he lifted his arm with an impatient gesture, and said:

"My lord, I have unexpectedly come into possession of new and most important evidence."

"Of what nature?" asked the judge.

"If it is conceivable," said counsel, "that in any question of personal identity the court will accept the evidence of all the tinkers and tailors, the riff-raff, the raggabash of the country-side, and reject that of the wife of the man whose estate is in question, perhaps it will be allowed that there are three persons who are essential to this examination—the brother of Paul Ritson, the defendant who claims to be Paul Ritson, and the convict who is suffering penal servitude in the name of Paul Drayton. I might name one other whose evidence might be yet more conclusive than that of any of these alone—the mother of Paul Ritson; but she is unhappily dead to the world."

Drayton was still on his feet, riveted to the spot where he stood. Obtuse as he was, he saw at a glance what had occurred. In all his calculations this chance had never suggested itself—that Hugh Ritson would risk the personal danger to bring him down.

"Can you put these persons into the witness-box?"

"My lord, it is, I presume, within the liberties of the defendant to keep carefully out of that box, but the court will not refuse to hear the evidence of the two persons of whom I speak—the brother of Paul Ritson and the convict known as Paul Drayton."

At this there was high commotion. Greta had leaned back in her chair, her bosom heaving, her face shadowed by lines of pain. Parson Christian stood behind her with a blank expression of bewilderment. Drayton's brows were tightened and his lips were drawn hard.

"None of their criss-crossin' for me," he muttered.

"You can ask for a new trial," said the judge.

"My lord, another case is pending, and on the issue in this case the other case must largely depend."

"How far has the present one proceeded?"

"The defendant's case is not yet completed."

During this scene Hugh Ritson had stood quietly by the table. He remained there with complete self-possession while counsel proceeded to explain that four days ago, in anticipation of this action and of another that had been threatened, a statutory declaration had been made in the presence of the Home Secretary and the law officers of the Crown. The first result of that statement was that the convict Drayton was now present in the court-house ready to appear at this trial.

The judge signified his desire that the convict might be brought in and heard.

Hugh Ritson motioned to a tall man who stood near, and immediately afterward a door was thrown open and another man stepped into the court-room.

Every eye was fixed upon him. He wore a convict's gray jacket, with the round badge marked "3. B 2001. P S," and the broad arrow beneath. His face was pale and rigid; his large eyes glittered; he was in his full manhood, but his close-cropped hair was slightly tinged with gray. He pushed his way through the people, who fell back to let him pass. When he reached the table he tapped it impatiently with one of his hands, which were fettered, and threw up his head with a glance of defiance. His whole bearing was that of a strong man who believed that every man's hand was against him, and who intended to let it be seen that his own hand was against every man's.

Counsel rose again, and asked that the defendant's witnesses might be recalled. This was done.

"John Proudfoot, Job Sheepshanks, Thomas Lowthwaite, Giles Raisley, look this way. Who is this man?"

There was a dead hush. Then, one by one, the men who had been named shook their heads. They did not know the convict. Indeed, he was terribly altered. The ordeal of the past two years had plowed strange lines in his face. At that moment he was less like himself than was the impostor who came there to personate him.

Hugh Ritson's manner did not change. Only a slight curl of the lip betrayed his feelings.

Counsel continued, "Is there any one in court who recognizes him?"

Not a voice responded. All was silence.

"Will the defendant stand side by side with him?"

Drayton leaped up with a boisterous laugh, and swaggered his way to the opposite side of the table. As he approached, the convict looked at him keenly.

"Will Mrs. Ritson come forward again?"

Greta had already risen, and was holding Parson Christian's hand with a nervous grip. She stepped apart, and going behind the two men, she came to a stand between them. On the one side stood Drayton, with a smirking face half turned toward the spectators; on the other stood the convict, his hands bound before him, his defiant glance softened to a look of tenderness, and his lips parted with the unuttered cry that was ready to burst from them.

"Greta," said Hugh Ritson, in a low tone of indescribable pathos, "which of these men is your husband?"

Counsel repeated the question in form.

Greta had slowly raised her eyes from the ground until they reached the convict's face. Then in an instant, in a flash of light, with the quick cry of a startled bird, she flung herself on his neck. Her fair head dropped on the frieze of the convict's jacket, and her sobs were all that broke the silence.

Hugh Ritson's emotion surged in his throat, but he stood quietly at the table. Only his slight figure swayed a little and his face quivered. His work was not yet done.

"This is the answer of nature," he said quietly.

Hugh Ritson was put into the witness-box, and in a voice that was full and strong, and that penetrated every corner of the court, he identified the convict as his brother, Paul Ritson.

Counsel for the defense had seemed to be stunned. Recovering himself, he tried to smile, and said:

"After this melodramatic interlude, perhaps I may be allowed to ask our new witness a few questions. Did you, at the Central Criminal Court, held at the Old Bailey in 1875, swear that the person who stands here in the dress of a convict was not Paul Ritson?"

"I did."

"Now for my second question. Did you also swear that the defendant was your brother, and therefore not Paul Drayton."

"I did."

"Then you were guilty of perjury at that time, or you are guilty of perjury now?"

"I was guilty of perjury then."

The judge interposed and asked if the witness was awakened to the enormity of the crime to which he confessed. Hugh Ritson bent his head.

"Are you conscious that you are rendering yourself liable to penal servitude?"

"I have signed a declaration of my guilt."

The answers were given in perfect calmness, but a vein of pathos ran through every word.

"Do you know that a few years back many a poor wretch whose crime was trifling compared with yours has gone from the dock to the gallows?"

"My guilt is unmitigated guilt. I make a voluntary statement. I am not here to appeal for mercy."

There was the hush of awe in the court.

The face of the convict wore an expression of amazement.

Counsel smiled again.

"I presume you know that the effect of the law officers of the Crown, believing the story that you tell us now is that, if they do so, the man whom you call your brother will be put into possession of the estate of which your late father died seized?"

"He is entitled to it."

Counsel turned to the jury with a smile.

"It is always necessary to find some standard by which to judge of human actions. The witness quarreled with the defendant four days ago, and this is his revenge. But I appeal to the court. Is this story credible? Is it not a palpable imposture?"

The judge again interposed.

"Men do not risk so much for a lie. The witness knows that when the court rises the sheriff may take him into custody."

At this counsel rose again and asked the bench not to play into the hands of the witness by apprehending him.

"Let the convict be examined," said the judge.

Paul Ritson raised his head; Greta sunk into a chair beneath him. He was not sworn.

The warder in charge put in an entry from the books of the prison. It ran: "Paul Drayton, five feet eleven inches, brown hair and eyes, aged thirty, licensed victualer, born in London, convicted of robbery at the scene of a railway accident."

"Does that entry properly describe you?" asked the judge.

The convict's eyes wandered.

"What's going on?" he said, in a tone of bewilderment.

"Attend, my man. Are you Paul Ritson, the eldest son of the late Allan Ritson?"

"Why do you want to know?" said the convict.

"It befits a witness who is permitted to come from the scene of a degrading punishment to give a prompt and decisive answer. What is your name, sir?"

"Find it out."

"My man," said the judge, more suavely, "we sit here in the name of the law, and the law could wish to stand your friend." (The convict laughed bitterly.) "Pray help us to a decision in the present perplexing case by a few frank answers. If you are Paul Drayton, you go back to Portland to complete the term of your imprisonment. If it can be proved that you are Paul Ritson, your case will be laid before the home officials, with the result that you will be liberated and re-established in your estate. First of all, which is your name—Paul Drayton or Paul Ritson?"

The convict did not answer at first. Then he said in a low tone:

"No law can re-establish me."

The judge added:

"Bethink you, if you are Paul Ritson, and an innocent man, the law can restore you to your young wife."

Visibly moved by this reference, the convict's eyes wandered to where Greta sat beside him, and the tension of his gaze relaxed.

The judge began again:

"You have been recognized by two witnesses—one claiming to be your brother, the other to be your wife—as Paul Ritson. Are you that person?"

The convict's face showed the agony he suffered. In a vague, uncertain, puzzled way he was thinking of the consequences of his answer. If he said he was Paul Ritson, it seemed to him that it must leak out that he was not the eldest legitimate son of his father. Then all the fabric of his mother's honor would there and then tumble to the ground. He recalled his oath; could he pronounce six words and not violate it? No, not six syllables. How those mouthing gossips would glory to see a good name trailed in the dust!

"Are you Paul Ritson, the eldest son and heir of Allan Ritson?"

The convict looked again at Greta. She rose to her feet beside him. All her soul was in her face, and cried:

"Answer, answer!"

"I can not answer," said the convict, in a loud, piercing voice.

At that terrible moment his strength seemed to leave him. He sunk backward into the chair from which Greta had risen.

She stood over him and put her hand tenderly on his head.

"Tell them it is true," she pleaded, "tell them you are my husband; tell them so; oh, tell them, tell them!" she cried in a tone of piteous supplication.

He raised to hers his weary eyes with a dumb cry for mercy from the appeal of love.

Only Hugh Ritson, of all who were there present, understood what was in the convict's heart.

"Paul Ritson is the rightful heir of his father and his mother's legitimate son," he muttered audibly.

The convict turned to where his brother sat, and looked at him with a face that seemed to grapple for the missing links of a chain of facts.

Counsel for the defense arose.

"It will be seen that the unhappy convict witness will not be used as an instrument of deception," he said. "He is Paul Drayton, and can not be made to pretend that he is Paul Ritson."

The hush of awe in the court was broken by the opening of a door behind the bench. Two women stood on the threshold. One of them was small, wrinkled, and old. She was Mrs. Drayton. The other was a nun in hood and cape. She was Sister Grace.

Hugh Ritson leaned toward counsel for the plaintiff, who promptly rose and said:

"The witness I spoke of as dead to the world is now present in the court."

Amid a buzz of conversation the nun was handed to the table. She raised her long veil and showed a calm, pale face. After the usual formalities, counsel addressed her.

"Mrs. Ritson," he said, "tell us which of the two men who sit opposite is your son."

Sister Grace answered in a clear, soft voice:

"Both are my sons. The convict is Paul Ritson, my son by Allan Ritson; the other is Paul Lowther, my son by an unhappy alliance with Robert Lowther."

Drayton jumped to his feet.

"There, that's enough of this!" he shouted, excitedly. "Damme, if I can stand any more of it!"

Bonnithorne reached over and whispered:

"Mad man, what are you doing? Hold your tongue!"

"It's all up. There's the old woman, too, come to give me away. Here, I say, I'm Paul Drayton; that's what I am, if you want to know."

"Let the sheriff take that man before a justice of the peace," said the judge.

"It was you that led me into this mess!" shouted Drayton at Bonnithorne. "Only for you I would have been in Australia by this time."

"Let the sheriff apprehend Mr. Bonnithorne also," said the judge. "As for you, sir," he continued, turning to Hugh Ritson, "I will report your evidence to the Public Prosecutor—who must be in possession of your statutory declaration—and leave the law officers to take their own course with regard to you."

The action for ejectment was adjourned.

Drayton and Bonnithorne did not trouble the world much longer. Within a month they were tried and condemned together—the one for personation; both for conspiracy.

Paul Ritson was removed in charge of his warder, to be confined in the town jail pending the arrival of instructions from the Secretary of State. Hugh Ritson walked out of the court-room a free man.



CHAPTER XVII.

Hugh Ritson returned to his room on the pit-brow. On his way there he passed a group of people congregated on the bridge at the town end. They fell apart as he walked through, but not an eye was raised to his, and not one glance of recognition came from his stony face. Toward the middle of the afternoon a solicitor came from Carlisle and executed a bill of sale on the machinery and general plant. The same evening, as the men on the day shift came up the shaft, and those on the night shift were about to go below, the wages were paid down to the last weights taken at the pit-mouth. Then Hugh Ritson closed his doors and began afresh his melancholy perambulation of the room.

That night—it was Wednesday night—as darkness fell on the mountain and moorland, there was a great outcry in the Vale. It started at the pit-mouth, and was taken up on every side. In less than a quarter of an hour a hundred people—men, women, and children—were gathered about the head of the shaft. There had been a run of sand in the pit, and some of the hands were imprisoned in the blocked-up workings. Cries, moans, and many sounds of weeping arose on the air in one dismal chorus. "I knew it would come;" "I telt the master lang ago;" "Where's my man?" "And mine?" "And my poor barn—no'but fifteen." "Anybody seen my Willie?" "Is that thee, Robbie, ma lad?—No." As every cageful of men and boys came to the surface, there was a rush of mothers, wives, and fathers to recognize their own.

Hugh Ritson went out and pushed his way through the people.

"Where is the sand running?" he asked of a pitman just landed.

"In the sandy vein, 2, 3, 1," answered the man.

"Then the shaft is clear?"

"Ay, but the water's blocked in the main working, and it's not safe to go down."

Hugh Ritson had taken the man's candle out of his hand, and was fixing it with the putty in the front of his own hat.

"Are you ready?" he shouted to the engine-man, above the babel of voices.

In another moment he had stepped into the cage and looped down the iron rail in front of it. There was a moment's silence among the panic-stricken people as the cage began to move downward.

At the bottom of the shaft a group of men waited to ascend. Their faces were lurid in the dim light. Before the cage grounded Hugh Ritson could hear their breathing. "How many of you are left?" he asked.

"No'but two now—Giles Raisley and auld Reuben," answered one of the men. The others, without heeding the master's question, had scrambled into the cage, and were already knocking the signal for the ascent.

Hugh Ritson turned toward the working known among the men as the sandy vein. The cage was now rising, and the pitman who had spoken found himself left on the pit bottom; the single moment that he had given to the master had lost him his chance of a place. He cast one stern glance upward, and a muttered oath was on his lips. At the next instant he had taken the direction followed by Hugh Ritson, and was walking one pace behind him.

In the silence the dull thud of their footsteps on the rock beneath mingled with the drip, drip of the water overhead. When they had gone a hundred yards down the narrow working there came another and far more terrible sound. It was such a sound as the sea might have made if it had rushed through a thousand crevices in the rock. It was the sound of the thousands of tons of sand as they forced their way from the dense mass above. And over the hiss as of the sea was the harsh crack of great timbers splitting like matchwood.

Toward the awful scene of this tumult Hugh Ritson quickened his steps. The man followed close at his heels. Presently their passage was blocked with sand like a wall. Then over their heads the cross-trees cracked, and the upright forks split and bent at the right and left of them. In another moment the ground beneath them shook under the new weight that lay on it. They stepped quickly back, and in an instant, with a groan such as the sea makes when it is sucked by the ebbing tide from a cave in a rock, the floor, with all its freight, went down a score of feet. It had fallen to an old working that lay below.

Then the bent forks hung from the roof in empty air. Silence followed this shock, and through the silence there came a feeble cry for help. Hugh Ritson stepped out, plucked his candle from his hat, and held it before his feet.

"Where are you?" he called, and his voice came back through the echoing depths beyond. Presently a man could be dimly seen clinging to a cross-piece in an alcove made for an air-shaft from the main working. To get to him the treacherous ground must be crossed, with its cracking roof, through which the sand slid even yet, and under the split timbers that still creaked.

Hugh Ritson did not hesitate; he turned to leap down, saying, "Follow me." But the man clung to him from behind.

"For God's sake, dunnot!" he cried. "I can not go there. It's mair nor my life is worth!"

Hugh Ritson twisted about, and looked him steadily in the face.

"What is your name, my man?"

"Davey Braithwaite."

"Then you are the young fellow whose wife died last week?"

"Ey," with a drooping head.

"Your child died before her, did it not?"

"Ey, he did, poor laal thing!"

"Your father and mother are gone, too?"

"They're gone, for sure!"

"And you have neither kith nor kin left in all the world?"

"Nay, no'but mysel' left."

Hugh Ritson said no more; a hard smile played on his white face, and at the next instant he had leaped down on to the bed of sand below.

The man recoiled a pace or two and wrung his hands. Before he was aware of what had happened, Giles Raisley and the master were standing beside him.

"Where were old Reuben and his gang stationed?" said Hugh Ritson.

"In the main working; but the water is dammed up; we can never pass."

They returned to the shaft bottom, and walked thence down the cutting that ran from it at right angles. A light burned far away in the dim vista of that long dark burrowing.

It was a candle stuck to the rock. The men who worked by it had left it there when they rushed off for their lives. Through the bottom of this working there ran a deep trough, but it was now dry.

This was the channel by which the whole pit was drained. Beyond the light the three men encountered another wall of sand, and from behind it and through it there came to them the dull thud and the plash of heavy water.

"If auld Reuben's theer, he's a dead man," said Giles Raisley, and he turned to go.

Hugh Ritson had struggled to the top of the heap, and was plowing the sand away from the roof with his hands. In a little while he had forced an opening, and could see into the dark space beyond. The water had risen to a reservoir of several feet deep. But it was still four or five feet from the roof, and over the black, surging, bubbling waves the imprisoned miner could be seen clinging to a ledge of rock. Half his body was already immersed. When the candle shot its streak of light through the aperture of sand, the poor creature uttered a feeble cry.

In another moment the master had wormed his body through the hole and dropped slowly into the water. Wading breast deep, he reached the pitman, gave him his hand, and brought him safely through the closing seam.

When the cage rose to the surface again, bringing back to life and the world the last of the imprisoned miners, a great cheer broke from many a lusty throat. Women who had never thought to bless the master, blessed him now with fervent tongues. Men who had thought little of the courage that could rest in that slight figure, fell aside at the sense of their own cowardice. Under the red glow that came from the engine fire many a hard face melted.

Hugh Ritson saw little of this, and heeded it not at all. He plucked the candle, still burning, from his hat, and threw it aside. Then he walked through the people toward his room, and when he got there he shut the door, almost slamming it in the faces of those who followed. He pulled down the window-blinds, and began afresh his perambulation to and fro.

He had grown paler and thinner. There was a somber light in his eyes, and his lips were whitening. His step, once quick and sure, despite his infirmity, was now less certain. He had not slept since the night of Mercy's death. Determined never to encounter again the pains and terrors of sleep, he had walked through the long hours of the four succeeding nights. He knew what the result must be, and did not shrink from it. Once only he had thought of a quicker way to the sure goal that was before him. Then he had opened a cupboard, and looked long and intently at a bottle that he took from its shelf. But he had put the bottle back. Why should he play the fool, and leap the life to come? Thus, night after night, he had walked and walked, never resting, never pausing, though the enfeebled limbs shook beneath him, and the four walls of the room reeled in his dazed eyes.

Before returning to their homes, the people gathered in the darkness about the office on the pit-brow and gave one last cheer.

The master heard them, and his lip curled.

"Simpletons!—they don't understand," he muttered, beneath his breath, and continued his melancholy walk.

Next morning, a banksman, who acted as personal attendant on Hugh Ritson, brought him his breakfast. It was not early.

The sun had risen, but the blinds of the office were still drawn, and a candle burned on the table. The man would have put out the candle and let in the sunlight, but the master forbid him. He was a Methodist, and hummed psalm tunes as he went about his work. This morning he was more than usually fresh and happy when he entered with his tray; but at the sight of Hugh Ritson's pallid face his own face saddened.

"You are a young man yet, Luke," said the master. "Let me see, how old are you?"

"Seventy-nine, sir. I was born in ninety-eight. That was when auld Bonnypart was agate of us and Nelson bashed him up."

"I dare say you have grandchildren by this time?"

"Bless you, ey, and great-grandchilder, and ten of them, too; and all well and hearty, thank the Lord!"

The sound of a bell, slowly tolling, came from across the dale. Hugh Ritson's face contracted, and his eyes fell.

"What bell is that?" he asked, in an altered tone.

"It's like to be the church bell. They're burying poor auld Matha's lass and her wee barn this morning."

Hugh Ritson did not touch his breakfast.

"Luke, close the shutters," he said, "and bring more candles."

He did not go out that day, but continued to walk to and fro in the darkened room. Toward nightfall he grew feverish, and rang frequently the bell that summoned the banksman. He had only some casual order, some message, some unimportant explanation.

At length the old man understood his purpose, and settled himself there for the night. They talked much during the early hours, and often the master laughed and jested. But the atmosphere that is breathed by a sleepless man is always heavy with sleep, and in spite of his efforts to keep awake, Luke dozed away in his chair. Then for hours there was a gloomy silence, broken only by the monotonous footfall within and the throb of the engine without.

The next day, Friday, the sun shone brilliantly, but the shutters of the little house on the pit-brow remained closed, and the candle still burned on the table. Hugh Ritson had grown perceptibly feebler, yet he continued his dreary walk. The old banksman was forbidden to send for a doctor, but he contrived to dispatch a messenger for Parson Christian. That night he watched with the master again. When the conversation failed, he sung. First, a psalm of David, "The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God;" then a revival hymn of Charles Wesley about ransom by Christ's blood.

It would have been a strange spectacle to strange eyes. The old man—young still, though seventy-nine, dear to troops of dear ones, encircled in his age by love and honor, living in poverty that was abundance, with faith that was itself the substance of things hoped for, his simple face ruddier and mellower than before—rocking his head and singing in the singleness of his heart. The other man—barely thirty, yet already old, having missed his youth, his thin cheeks pallid as linen, his eyes burning with a somber light—alone in the world, desolate, apart—walking with an uncertain step and a tremor of the whole frame, which seemed to lurch for poise and balance, yet swinging his arms with the sweep of the melody, and smiling a forced smile through his hard and whitened lips.

When the singing ceased, Hugh Ritson paused suddenly and turned to the old banksman.

"Luke," he said, abruptly, "I suppose there will be many to follow you when your time comes?"

"Ey, please God," answered the banksman, dashing away a furtive drop that had rolled on to his cheek; "there'll be my childer, and my childer's childer, and their childer, forby. Maybe the barns will lay me behind the mother; poor auld body!"

Hugh Ritson's face darkened, and he resumed his walk.

"Tut! what matter?" he asked himself; "the night winds are enough to moan over a man's grave." And he laughed a little.

Next morning—Saturday morning—he wrote a letter, and sent Luke to the village to post it. Then he attended to some business relating to the pit. After that, he shut the door and bolted it. When the old man brought the midday meal he knocked in vain, and had to go away.

Night closed in, and still there came no answer to the old man's knock. When the sun had set the wind had risen. It threatened to be a tempestuous night.

Toward ten o'clock Parson Christian arrived. He had wrestled long with his own heart as to what course it was his duty to take. He had come at last in answer to the banksman's summons, and now he knocked at the door. There was no answer. The wind was loud in the trees overhead, but he could hear the restless footfall within. He knocked again, and yet again.

Then the bolt was drawn, and a voice at once strange and familiar cried, "Come in, Parson Christian."

He had not called or spoken.

The parson entered. When his eyes fell on Hugh Ritson's face he shuddered as he had never shuddered before. Many a time he had seen death in a living face, but never anything like this. The livid cheeks were stony, the white lips were drawn hard, the somber eyes burned like a deep, slow fire, the yellow hands were gaunt and restless. There was despair on the contracted brow, but no repentance. And the enfeebled limbs trembled, but still shuffled on—on, on, on, through their longer journey than from Gabbatha to Golgotha. The very atmosphere of the room breathed of death.

"Let me pray with you," said the parson, softly, and without any other words, he went down on his knees.

"Ay, pray for me—pray for me; but you lose your labor; nothing can save me."

"Let us call on God," said the parson.

A bitter laugh broke from Hugh Ritson's lips.

"What! and take to him the dregs and rinsings of my life? No!"

"The blood of Christ has ransomed the world. It can save the worst sinner of us all, and turn away the heavy wrath of God."

Hugh Ritson broke again into a bitter laugh.

"The end has come of sin, as of trouble. No matter." Then, with an awful solemnity, he added: "My soul is barren. It is already given over to the undying worm. I shall die to-morrow at sunrise."

"No man knows the day nor the hour—"

Hugh Ritson repeated, with a fearful emphasis, "I shall die as the sun rises on Sunday morning."

Parson Christian remained with him the weary night through. The wind moaned and howled outside. It licked the walls as with the tongues of serpents. The parson prayed fervently, but Hugh Ritson's voice never once rose with his. To and fro, to and fro, the dying man continued his direful walk. At one moment he paused and said with a ghastly smile, "This dying is an old story. It has been going on every day for six thousand years, and yet we find it as terrible as ever."

Toward three in the morning he threw open the shutters. The windows were still dark; it seemed as if the dawn were far away. "It is coming," he said calmly. "I knew it must come soon. Let us go out to meet it."

With infinite effort he pulled his ulster over his shoulders, put on his hat, and opened the door.

"Where are you going?" said the parson, and his voice broke.

"To the top of the fell."

"Why there?"

Hugh Ritson turned his heavy eyes upon him. "To see the new day dawn," he said, with an awful pathos.

He had already stepped out into the gloom. Parson Christian followed him. They took the path that led through the moor end to the foot of Cat Bells. The old man offered his arm, but Hugh Ritson shook his head and walked one pace ahead. It was a terrible journey. The wind had dropped. In the air the night and day commingled. The dying man struggled along with the firm soul of a stricken lion. Step by step and with painful labor they ascended the bare side of the fell in the gray light of morning. They reached the top at last.

Below them the moorland lay dark and mute. The mist was around them. They seemed to stand on an islet of the clouds. In front the day-break was bursting the confines of the bleak racks of cloud. Then the day came in its wondrous radiance, and flooded the world in a vast ocean of light.

On the mountain brow Hugh Ritson resumed his melancholy walk. The old parson muttered, as if to himself, "Wilt thou break a leaf driven to and fro? Wilt thou pursue the dry stubble?" Hugh Ritson overheard the words, and all his manner changed. The stubborn lips softened, the somber eye melted, the contracted brow relaxed, and for the first time in all this length of years, he cried like a little child.

At the same instant the sun swept up, and he fell. Parson Christian bent over him. The crimson of the east twas reflected on his white face. The new day had dawned.

On the Tuesday following two mourners stood by an open grave in the church-yard of Newlands. One of them was white-headed; the other wore the jacket and cap, the badge and broad arrow of a convict. The sexton and his man had lowered the coffin to its last home, and then stepped aside. A tall man leaned on the lych-gate, and a group of men and women stood in silence by the porch of the church. The afternoon sun was low, and the shadows of the tombstones stretched far on the grass.

The convict went down on his knees, and looked long into the grave. When he arose, the company that had gathered about the porch had gone, and voices singing a hymn came from within the old church. It was the village choir practicing. The world's work had begun again.



CHAPTER XVIII.

Two days later the fell behind the Ghyll was a scene of unusual animation. It was the day of the shearing. The sheep, visibly whiter and more fleecy for a washing of some days before, had been gathered into stone folds. Clippers were seated on creels ranged about a turf fire, over which a pot of tar hung from a triangle of boughs. Boy "catchers" brought up the sheep, one by one, and girl "helpers" carried away the fleeces, hot and odorous, and hung them over the open barn doors. As the sheep were stripped, they were tugged to the fire and branded from the bubbling tar with the smet mark of the Ritsons. The metallic click of the shears was in the air, and over all was the blue sky and the brilliant sunshine.

In a white overall, stained with patches of tar and some streaks of blood, smudged with soap and scraps of the clinging wool, Parson Christian moved among the shearers, applying plentiful doses of salve from a huge can to the snips made in the skin of the sheep by the accidents of the shears.

"We might have waited for the maister afore shearing—eh?" said Reuben, from one of the creels.

"He'll be here before we finish, please the Lord," answered the parson.

"Is it to-day you're to gang for him?"

"Yes, this afternoon."

"A daub on this leg, parson, where she kicked—deuced take her!... It's like you'll bring him home in a car?"

"Ay; Randal Alston has loaned me his mare."

"Why, man, what a upshot we'll have, for sure—bacon pie and veal and haggis, and top stannin pie and puddings, I reckon.... Just a hand to her leg, parson, while I strip the coat and waistcoat off this black-faced herdwick.... Is the mistress to come home, too?"

"Nay, Reuben, Mrs. Ritson has gone back to where she came from."

"Weel, it's no'but naturable, after all that's happent.... Easy now ... be quiet, wilta ... dusta want another snip, eh?... And young Mistress Greta—it's like she'll be mistress now?"

"It's very likely she'll come to the Ghyll with her husband, Reuben."

"God bless her! And there's been no luck on the land since he left it—and everything a fault, too.... There, she's stripped. Away with her, Natt, man, and de'il tak' her."

In the afternoon a vast crowd of men, women and children had gathered once more about the old town-hall at Keswick. They laughed and bantered and sung. Presently the door of the hall was thrown open, and two men came out. One was Paul Ritson, no longer clad as a convict; the other was Parson Christian. The people hailed them with a mighty shout, lifted them into a gig that was drawn up in the market-place, took out the horses and crowded into the shafts. Then they set off with a great cheer through the town and the country road, the dust rising in clouds behind them.

They took the road to the west of the valley, and as they passed under the wood, an old man, much bent, was easing a smoking fire in the charcoal pit. He paused and raised himself, his iron rod in his hand, and lifted his heavy eyes toward the clamorous company. The gig flew past with its shouts, its cheers, and its noisy laughter, and the old man turned silently back to his work.

When they came near to the vicarage, Paul leaped from the carriage over the heads of the men who pulled it, vaulted the gate, and bounded into the house. There was one who waited for him there, and in an instant she was locked close in his arms. "At last!" he whispered. Her heart overflowed; she dropped her fair young head on his heaving breast, and wept sweet tears.

Parson Christian came rolling up the path surrounded by a tumultuous throng. Foremost and lustiest were the blacksmith and the miller, and close behind came the landlord and the postman. All were shouting as if their brassy throats might crack.

There was high revel at the Ghyll that evening. First came the feasting in the old kitchen: huge rounds of beef, quarters of lamb, pease, and sweet puddings and pies. Then came the dancing in the barn, lighted by candles in cloven sticks, and lanterns of turnips that were scooped out hollow.

But at the vicarage Paul and Greta sat alone in silence and with clasped hands. Parson Christian came in and out at intervals, gossiping cheerily of the odds and ends of daily life, as if its even tenor had never been disturbed. They supped together, and sat on till midnight; and then the old Christian took down his green tome and wrote:

"June 30.—So Paul being to return home after his long absence, I spent the forenoon on the fell shearing, and earned a stone of wool and a windle of rye. In the afternoon I set forward toward Keswick, wherefor Randal Alston had loaned me his mare and gig. At the Flying Horse I lighted not, but stood while I drank a pot of ale with John Proudfoot and Richard Parkinson and a neighbor that comes to-morrow to thatch the low barn for me. Then direct to Keswick, where there was a great concourse, and a hearty welcome, and much rejoicings that warmed me and came nigh to break me withal. Got son Paul at last, and would have driven direct home, but the good folk were not minded that it should be so, and naught would do but that they must loose the mare and run in the shafts. So we reached home about six, and found all well, and my love Greta, after long waiting in her closet, very busy with Paul, who had run in ahead of me. So I went out again and foddered and watered the mare, for Peter is sometimes a sad fatch and will not always give a horse what is worth its trouble in the eating. And being thrang this evening a-mending the heels of my old clock boots with lath nails, whereof I bought a pennyworth at Thomas Seed's shop in the market-place, I saw little of Paul, but left him to Greta. Then supped, and read a psalm and prayed in my family, and sat till full midnight. So I retire to my lodging-room, at peace with all the world, and commend my all to God. The Lord forgive the sins of me and mine that we have committed in these our days of trial. Blessed be God who has wrought our victory, and overcome our enemies and brought us out more than conquerors.

Amen."

Parson Christian had put down the pen, and was sprinkling the writing with sand from a pepper-castor, when Brother Peter came in with candles in his hand and a letter under his abridged arm. "Laal Tom o' Dint gave me this for thee," he said to Paul, and dropped the letter on to his knees. "I was sa thrang with all their bodderments, that I don't know as I didna forget it."

Parson Christian returned the green-clad book to its shelf, took up his candle, bid good-night, and went to bed.

Brother Peter shambled out, and then Paul and Greta were left alone.

Paul opened the letter. It was inclosed in a sheet of paper that bore the stamp of the Convent of St. Margaret, and these words only, "Sent on by Sister Grace." Paul began to read the letter aloud, Greta looking over his shoulder. But as he proceeded his voice faltered, and then he stopped. Then, in silence, the eyes of both traversed the written words. They ran:

"Mother, I have wronged you deeply, and yours is a wrong that may never be repaired. The past does not return, and what is done is done with. It is not allowed to us to raze out the sins and the sufferings of the days that are gone; they stand and will endure. I am not so bad a man as perhaps I seem; but of what avail is it to defend myself now? and who would believe me? My life has been one long error, and the threads of my fate have been tangled. Have I not passed before our little world for a stern and callous man? Yet the blight of my soul has been passion. Yearning for love where love could never be returned, I am the ruins of what I might have been. If I did wrong knowingly, it was not until passion mastered me; if I saw things as they did not exist, it was because passion made me blind. Mother, if there is One above to watch and judge our little lives, surely He sees this, and reckons the circumstances with the deed.

"Tell her that I wish her peace. If I were a man used to pray, perhaps I would ask Heaven to bless her. But my heart is barren of prayer. And what, after all, boots my praying? I have given her back at last to the love of a noble man. And now my wasted life is done, and this is the end—a sorry end!

"Mother, I shall not live to suffer the earthly punishment of my crime. Never fear—my hand shall not be lifted against myself. Be sure of that, whatever else may seem doubtful. But very soon this passionate and rebellious soul will stand for judgment before its awaiting God.

"Farewell, my mother, farewell!"