"TANTIA TOPEE."

On receipt of this, Little, who had tasted the last-mentioned drugs, showed such undisguised anxiety that Bolt sent for Ransome. He came directly, and was closeted with the firm. Bolt handed him the letters, told him the case, and begged leave to put him a question. "Is the police worth any thing, or nothing, in this here town?"

"It is worth something, I hope, gentlemen."

"How much, I wonder? Of all the bands that have been stolen, and all the people that have been blown up, and scorched and vitrioled, and shot at, and shot, by Union men, did ever you and your bobbies nail a single malefactor?"

Now Mr. Ransome was a very tall man, with a handsome, dignified head, a long black beard, and pleasant, dignified manners. When short, round, vulgar Mr. Bolt addressed him thus, it really was like a terrier snapping at a Newfoundland dog. Little felt ashamed, and said Mr. Ransome had been only a few months in office in the place. "Thank you, Mr. Little," said the chief constable. "Mr Bolt, I'll ask you a favor. Meet me at a certain place this evening, and let me reply to your question then and there."

This singular proposal excited some curiosity, and the partners accepted the rendezvous. Ransome came to the minute, and took the partners into the most squalid part of this foul city. At the corner of a narrow street he stepped and gave a low whistle. A policeman in plain clothes came to him directly.

"They are both in the 'Spotted Dog,' sir, with half a dozen more."

"Follow me, and guard the door. Will you come, too, gentlemen?"

The "Spotted Dog" was a low public, with one large room and a sanded floor. Mr. Ransome walked in and left the door open, so that his three companions heard and saw all that passed.

"Holland and Cheetham, you are wanted."

"What for?"

"Wilde's affair. He has come to himself, and given us your names."

On this the two men started up and were making for the door. Ransome whipped before it. "That won't do."

Then there was a loud clatter of rising feet, oaths, threats, and even a knife or two drawn; and, in the midst of it all, the ominous click of a pistol, and then dead silence; for it was Ransome who had produced that weapon. "Come, no nonsense," said he. "Door's guarded, street's guarded, and I'm not to be trifled with."

He then handed his pistol to the officer outside with an order, and, stepping back suddenly, collared Messrs. Holland and Cheetham with one movement, and, with a powerful rush, carried them out of the house in his clutches. Meantime the policeman had whistled, there was a conflux of bobbies, and the culprits were handcuffed and marched off to the Town Hall.

"Five years' penal servitude for that little lot," said Ransome.

"And now, Mr. Bolt, I have answered your question to the best of my ability."

"You have answered it like a man. Will you do as much for us?"

"I'll do my best. Let me examine the place now that none of them are about."

Bolt and Ransome went together, but Little went home: he had an anxiety even more pressing, his mother's declining health. She had taken to pining and fretting ever since Dr. Amboyne brought the bad news from Cairnhope; and now, instead of soothing and consoling her son, she needed those kind offices from him; and, I am happy to say, she received them. He never spent an evening away from her. Unfortunately he did not succeed in keeping up her spirits, and the sight of her lowered his own.

At this period Grace Carden was unmixed comfort to him; she encouraged him to encroach a little, and visit her twice a week instead of once, and she coaxed him to confide all his troubles to her. He did so; he concealed from his mother that he was at war with the trade again, but he told Grace everything, and her tender sympathy was the balm of his life. She used to put on cheerfulness for his sake, even when she felt it least.

One day, however, he found her less bright than usual, and she showed him an advertisement—Bollinghope house and park for sale; and she was not old enough nor wise enough to disguise from him that this pained her. Some expressions of regret and pity fell from her; that annoyed Henry, and he said, "What is that to us?"

"Nothing to you: but I feel I am the cause. I have not used him well, that's certain."

Henry said, rather cavalierly, that Mr. Coventry was probably selling his house for money, not for love, and (getting angry) that he hoped never to hear the man's name mentioned again.

Grace Carden was a little mortified by his tone, but she governed herself and said sadly, "My idea of love was to be able to tell you every thought of my heart, even where my conscience reproaches me a little. But if you prefer to exclude one topic—and have no fear that it may lead to the exclusion of others—"

They were on the borders of a tiff; but Henry recovered himself and said firmly, "I hope we shall not have a thought unshared one day; but, just for the present, it will be kinder to spare me that one topic."

"Very well, dearest," said Grace. "And, if it had not been for the advertisement—" she said no more, and the thing passed like a dark cloud between the lovers.

Bollinghope house and park were actually sold that very week; they were purchased, at more than their value, by a wealthy manufacturer: and the proceeds of this sale and the timber cleared off all Coventry's mortgages, and left him with a few hundred pounds in cash, and an estate which had not a tree on it, but also had not a debt upon it.

Of course he forfeited, by this stroke, his position as a country gentleman; but that he did not care about, since it was all done with one view, to live comfortably in Paris far from the intolerable sight of his rival's happiness with the lady he loved.

He bought in at the sale a few heirlooms and articles of furniture—who does not cling, at the last moment, to something of this kind?—and rented a couple of unfurnished rooms in Hillsborough to keep them in. He fixed the day of his departure, arranged his goods, and packed his clothes. Then he got a letter of credit on Paris, and went about the town buying numerous articles of cutlery.

But this last simple act led to strange consequences. He was seen and followed; and in the dead of the evening, as he was cording with his own hands a box containing a few valuables, a heavy step mounted the stair, and there was a rude knock at the door.

Mr. Coventry felt rather uncomfortable, but he said, "Come in."

The door was opened, and there stood Sam Cole.

Coventry received him ill. He looked up from his packing and said, "What on earth do you want, sir?"

But it was not Cole's business to be offended. "Well, sir," said he, "I've been looking out for you some time, and I saw you at our place; so I thought I'd come and tell you a bit o' news."

"What is that?"

"It is about him you know of; begins with a hel."

"Curse him! I don't want to hear about him. I'm leaving the country. Well, what is it?"

"He is wrong with the trade again."

"What is that to me?—Ah! sit down, Cole, and tell me."

Cole let him know the case, and assured him that, sooner or later, if threats did not prevail, the Union would go any length.

"Should you be employed?"

"If it was a dangerous job, they'd prefer me."

Mr. Coventry looked at his trunks, and then at Sam Cole. A small voice whispered "Fly." He stifled that warning voice, and told Cole he would stay and watch this affair, and Cole was to report to him whenever any thing fresh occurred. From that hour this gentleman led the life of a malefactor, dressed like a workman, and never went out except at night.

Messrs. Bolt and Little were rattened again, and never knew it till morning. This time it was not the bands, but certain axle-nuts and screws that vanished. The obnoxious machines came to a standstill, and Bolt fumed and cursed. However, at ten o'clock, he and the foreman were invited to the Town hall, and there they found the missing gear, and the culprit, one of the very workmen employed at high wages on the obnoxious machines.

Ransome had bored a small hole in the ceiling, by means of which this room was watched from above; the man was observed, followed, and nabbed. The property found on him was identified and the magistrate offered the prisoner a jury, which he declined; then the magistrate dealt with the case summarily, refused to recognize rattening, called the offense "petty larceny," and gave the man six months' prison.

Now as Ransome, for obvious reasons, concealed the means by which this man had been detected, a conviction so mysterious shook that sense of security which ratteners had enjoyed for many years, and the trades began to find that craft had entered the lists with craft.

Unfortunately, those who directed the Saw-grinders' Union thought the existence of the trade at stake, and this minor defeat merely exasperated them.

Little received a letter telling him he was acting worse than Brinsley, who had been shot in the Briggate; and asking him, as a practical man, which he thought was likely to die first, he or the Union? "You won't let us live; why should we let you?"

Bolt was threatened in similar style, but he merely handed the missives to Ransome; he never flinched.

Not so Little. He got nervous; and, in a weak moment, let his mother worm out of him that he was at war with the trades again.

This added anxiety to her grief, and she became worse every day.

Then Dr. Amboyne interfered, and, after a certain degree of fencing—which seems inseparable from the practice of medicine—told Henry plainly he feared the very worst if this went on; Mrs. Little was on the brink of jaundice. By his advice Henry took her to Aberystwith in Wales, and, when he had settled her there, went back to his troubles.

To those was now added a desolate home; gone was the noble face, the maternal eye, the soothing voice, the unfathomable love. He never knew all her value till now.

One night, as he sat by himself sad and disconsolate, his servant came to tell him there was a young woman inquiring for Mrs. Little. Henry went out to her, and it was Jael Dence. He invited her in, and told her what had happened. Jael saw his distress, and gave him her womanly sympathy. "And I came to tell her my own trouble," said she; "fie on me!"

"Then tell it me, Jael. There, take off your shawl and sit down. They shall make you a cup of tea."

Jael complied, with a slight blush; but as to her trouble, she said it was not worth speaking of in that house.

Henry insisted, however, and she said, "Mine all comes of my sister marrying that Phil Davis. To tell you the truth, I went to church with a heavy heart on account of their both beginning with a D—Dence and Davis; for 'tis an old saying—

"'If you change the name, and not the letter, You change for the worse, and not for the better.'

"Well, sir, it all went wrong somehow. Parson, he was South country; and when his time came to kiss the bride, he stood and looked ever so helpless, and I had to tell him he must kiss her; and even then he stared foolish-like a bit before he kissed her, and the poor lass's face getting up and the tear in her eye at being slighted. And that put Patty out for one thing: and then she wouldn't give away the ribbon to the fastest runner—the lads run a hundred yards to the bride, for ribbon and kiss, you know;—wasn't the ribbon she grudged, poor wench; but the fastest runner in Cairnhope town is that Will Gibbon, a nasty, ugly, slobbering chap, that was always after her, and Philip jealous of him; so she did for the best, and Will Gibbon safe to win it. But the village lads they didn't see the reason, and took it all to themselves. Was she better than their granddam? and were they worse than their grandsires? They ran on before, and fired the anvil when she passed: just fancy! an affront close to her own door: and, sir, she walked in a doors crying. There was a wedding for you! George the blacksmith was that hurt at their making free with his smithy to affront her, he lifted his arm for the first time, and pretty near killed a couple of them, poor thoughtless bodies. Well, sir, Phil Davis always took a drop, you know, and, instead of mending, he got worse; they live with father, and of course he has only to go to the barrel; old-fashioned farmers like us don't think to spy on the ale. He was so often in liquor, I checked him; but Patty indulged him in every thing. By-and-by my lord gets ever so civil to me; 'What next?' said I to myself. One fine evening we are set upstairs at our tea; in he comes drunk, and says many things we had to look at one another and excuse. Presently he tells us all that he has made a mistake; he has wedded Patty, and I'm the one he likes the best. But I thought the fool was in jest; but Patty she gave a cry as if a knife had gone through her heart. Then my blood got up in a moment. 'That's an affront to all three,' said I: 'and take your answer, ye drunken sow,' said I. I took him by the scruff of the neck and just turned him out of the room and sent him to the bottom of the stairs headforemost. Then Patty she quarreled with me, and father he sided with her. And so I gave them my blessing, and told them to send for me in trouble; and I left the house I was born in. It all comes of her changing her name, and not her letter." Here a few tears interrupted further comment.

Henry consoled her, and asked her what she was going to do.

She said she did not know; but she had a good bit of money put by, and was not afraid of work, and, in truth, she had come there to ask Mrs. Little's advice, "poor lady. Now don't you mind me, Mr. Henry, your trouble is a deal worse than mine."

"Jael," said he, "you must come here and keep my house till my poor mother is better."

Jael colored and said, "Nay, that will not do. But if you could find me something to do in your great factory—and I hear you have enemies there; you might as well have a friend right in the middle of them. Eh, but I'd keep my eyes and ears open for you."

Henry appreciated this proposal, and said there were plenty of things she could do; she could hone, she could pack, she could superintend, and keep the girls from gabbling; "That," said he, "is the real thing that keeps them behind the men at work."

So Jael Dence lodged with a female cousin in Hillsborough, and filled a position of trust in the factory of Bolt and Little: she packed, and superintended, and the foreman paid her thirty shillings a week. The first time this was tendered her she said severely, "Is this right, young man?" meaning, "Is it not too much?"

"Oh, you will be raised if you stay with us three months."

"Raised?" said the virtuous rustic! Then, looking loftily round on the other women, "What ever do these factory folk find to grumble at?"

Henry told Grace all about this, and she said, rather eagerly, "Ah, I am glad of that. You'll have a good watch-dog."

It was a shrewd speech. The young woman soon found out that Little was really in danger, and she was all eyes and ears, and no tongue.

Yet neither her watchfulness, nor Ransome's, prevailed entirely against the deviltries of the offended Union. Machinery was always breaking down by pure accident; so everybody swore, and nobody believed: the water was all let out of the boiler, and the boiler burst. Bands were no longer taken but they were cut. And, in short, the works seemed to be under a curse.

And, lest the true origin of all these mishaps should be doubted, each annoyance was followed by an anonymous letter. These were generally sent to Little. A single sentence will indicate the general tone of each.

1. "All these are but friendly warnings, to save your life if possible."

2. "I never give in. I fight to death, and with more craft and duplicity than Bolt and Ransome. They will never save you from me, if you persist. Ask others whether I ever failed to keep my word."

3. "If I but move my finger, you are sent into eternity."

Henry Little's nerve began to give way more and more.

Meantime Cole met Mr. Coventry, and told him what was going on beneath the surface: at the same time he expressed his surprise at the extraordinary forbearance shown by the Union. "Grotait is turning soft, I think. He will not give the word to burn Sebastopol."

"Then do it without him."

Cole shook his head, and said he daren't. But, after some reflection, he said there was a mate of his who was not so dependent on Grotait: he might be tempted perhaps to do something on his own hook, Little being wrong with the trade, and threatened. "How much would you stand?"

"How far would your friend go?"

"I'll ask him."

Next day Cole walked coolly into the factory at dinner-time and had a conversation with Hill, one of the workmen, who he knew was acting for the Union, and a traitor in his employers' camp. He made Hill a proposal. Hill said it was a very serious thing; he would think of it, and meet him at a certain safe place and tell him.

Cole strolled out of the works, but not unobserved. Jael Dence had made it her business to know every man in the factory by sight, and observing, from a window, a stranger in conversation with Hill, she came down and met Cole at the gate. She started at sight of him: he did not exactly recognize her; but, seeing danger in her eye, took to his heels, and ran for it like a deer: but Jael called to some of the men to follow him, but nobody moved. They guessed it was a Union matter. Jael ran to Little, and told him that villain, who had escaped from Raby Hall, had been in the works colloguing with one of the men.

Ransome was sent for, and Cole described to him.

As for Hill, Jael watched him like a cat from that hour, since a man is known by his friends. She went so far as to follow him home every evening.

Cole got fifty pounds out of Coventry for Hill, and promised him twenty. For this sum Hill agreed to do Little. But he demanded some time to become proficient in the weapon he meant to use.

During the interval events were not idle. A policeman saw a cutter and a disguised gentleman talking together, and told Ransome. He set spies to discover, if possible, what that might mean.

One day the obnoxious machines were stopped by an ACCIDENT to the machinery, and Little told Jael this, and said, "Have you a mind to earn five pound a week?"

"Ay, if I could do it honestly?"

"Let us see the arm that flung Phil Davis down-stairs."

Jael colored a little, but bared her left arm at command.

"Good heavens!" cried Little. "What a limb! Why mine is a shrimp compared with it."

"Ay, mine has the bulk, but yours the pith."

"Oh, come; if your left arm did that, what must your right be?"

"Oh," said Jael, "you men do every thing with your right hand; but we lasses know no odds. My left is as strong as my right, and both at your service."

"Then come along with me."

He took her into the "Experiment Room," explained the machine to her, gave her a lesson or two; and so simple was the business that she soon mastered her part of it; and Little with his coat off, and Jael, with her noble arms bare, ground long saws together secretly; and Little, with Bolt's consent, charged the firm by the gross. He received twenty-four pounds per week, out of which he paid Jael six, in spite of her "How can a lass's work be worth all that?" and similar remonstrances.

Being now once more a workman, and working with this loyal lass so many hours a day, his spirits rose a little, and his nerves began to recover their tone.

But meantime Hill was maturing his dark design.

In going home, Little passed through one place he never much liked, it was a longish close, with two sharp rectangular turns.

Since he was threatened by the trade, he never entered this close without looking behind him. He did not much fear an attack in front, being always armed with pistols now.

On a certain night he came to this place as usual, went as far as the first turn, then looked sharply round to see if he was followed; but there was nobody behind except a woman, who was just entering the court. So he went on.

But a little way down this close was a small public-house, and the passage-door was ajar, and a man watching. No sooner was Little out of sight than he emerged, and followed him swiftly on tiptoe.

The man had in his hand a weapon that none but a Hillsborough cutler would have thought of; yet, as usual, it was very fit for the purpose, being noiseless and dangerous, though old-fashioned. It was a long strong bow, all made of yew-tree. The man fitted an arrow to this, and running lightly to the first turn, obtained a full view of Little's retiring figure, not fifteen yards distant.

So well was the place chosen, that he had only to discharge his weapon and then run back. His victim could never see him.

He took a deliberate aim at Little's back, drew the arrow to the head, and was about to loose it, when a woman's arm was flung round his neck.



CHAPTER XXXII.

Coventry and Cole met that night near a little church.

Hill was to join them, and tell them the result.

Now, as it happens, Little went home rather late that night; so these confederates waited, alternately hoping and fearing, a considerable time.

Presently, something mysterious occurred that gave them a chill. An arrow descended, as if from the clouds, and stuck quivering on a grave not ten yards from them. The black and white feathers shone clear in the moonlight.

To Coventry it seemed as if Heaven was retaliating on him.

The more prosaic but quick-witted cutler, after the first stupefaction, suspected it was the very arrow destined for Little, and said so.

"And Heaven flings it back to us," said Coventry, and trembled in every limb.

"Heaven has naught to do in it. The fool has got drunk, and shot it in the air. Anyway, it mustn't stick there to tell tales."

Cole vaulted over the church-yard wall, drew it out of the grave, and told Coventry to hide it.

"Go you home," said he. "I'll find out what this means."

Hill's unexpected assailant dragged him back so suddenly and violently that the arrow went up at an angle of forty-five, and, as the man loosed the string to defend himself, flew up into the sky, and came down full a hundred yards from the place.

Hill twisted violently round and, dropping the bow, struck the woman in the face with his fist; he had not room to use all his force; yet the blow covered her face with blood. She cried out, but gripped him so tight by both shoulders that he could not strike again but he kicked her savagely. She screamed, but slipped her arms down and got him tight round the waist. Then he was done for; with one mighty whirl she tore him off his feet in a moment, then dashed herself and him under her to the ground with such ponderous violence that his head rang loud on the pavement and he was stunned for a few seconds. Ere he quite recovered she had him turned on his face, and her weighty knee grinding down his shoulders, while her nimble hands whipped off her kerchief and tied his hands behind him in a twinkling.

So quickly was it all done, that by the time Little heard the scrimmage, ascertained it was behind him, and came back to see, she was seated on her prisoner, trembling and crying after her athletic feat, and very little fit to cope with the man if he had not been tied.

Little took her by the hands. "Oh, my poor Jael! What is the matter? Has the blackguard been insulting you?" And, not waiting for an answer, gave him a kick that made him howl again.

"Yes, kill him, the villain! he wanted to murder you. Oh, oh, oh!"

She could say no more, but became hysterical.

Henry supported her tenderly, and wiped the blood from her face; and as several people came up, and a policeman, he gave the man in charge, on Jael's authority, and he was conveyed to the station accordingly, he and his bow.

They took Jael Dence to a chemist's shop, and gave her cold water and salts: the first thing she did, when she was quite herself, was to seize Henry Little's hand and kiss it with such a look of joy as brought tears into his eyes.

Then she told her story, and was taken in a cab to the police-office, and repeated her story there.

Then Henry took her to Woodbine Villa, and Grace Carden turned very pale at Henry's danger, though passed: she wept over Jael, and kissed her; and nobody could make enough of her.

Grace Carden looked wistfully at Henry and said, "Oh that I had a strong arm to defend you!"

"Oh, Miss Grace," said Jael, "don't you envy me. Go away with him from this wicked, murdering place. That will be a deal better than any thing I can do for him."

"Ah, would to Heaven I could this minute!" said Grace, clinging tenderly to his shoulder. She insisted on going home with him and sharing his peril for once.

Hill was locked up for the night.

In the morning a paper was slipped into his hand. "Say there was no arrow."

He took this hint, and said that he was innocent as a babe of any harm. He had got a bow to repair for a friend, and he went home twanging it, was attacked by a woman, and, in his confusion, struck her once, but did not repeat the blow.

Per contra, Jael Dence distinctly swore there was an arrow, with two white feathers and one black one, and that the prisoner was shooting at Mr. Little. She also swore that she had seen him colloguing with another man, who had been concerned in a former attempt on Mr. Little, and captured, but had escaped from Raby Hall.

On this the magistrate declined to discharge the prisoner; but, as no arrow could be found at present, admitted him to bail, two securities fifty pounds each, which was an indirect way of imprisoning him until the Assizes.

This attempt, though unsuccessful in one way, was very effective in another. It shook Henry Little terribly; and the effect was enhanced by an anonymous letter he received, reminding him there were plenty of noiseless weapons. Brinsley had been shot twice, and no sound heard. "When your time comes, you'll never know what hurt you." The sense of a noiseless assassin eternally dogging him preyed on Little's mind and spirits, and at last this life on the brink of the grave became so intolerable that he resolved to leave Hillsborough, but not alone.

He called on Grace Carden, pale and agitated.

"Grace," said he, "do you really love me?"

"Oh, Henry! Do I love you?"

"Then save me from this horrible existence. Oh, my love, if you knew what it is to have been a brave man, and to find your courage all oozing away under freezing threats, that you know, by experience, will be followed by some dark, subtle, bloody deed or other. There, they have brought me down to this, that I never go ten steps without looking behind me, and, when I go round a corner, I turn short and run back, and wait at the corner to see if an assassin is following me. I tremble at the wind. I start at my own shadow."

Grace threw her arms round his neck, and stopped him with tears and kisses.

"Ah, bless you, my love!" he cried, and kissed her fondly. "You pity me—you will save me from this miserable, degrading life?"

"Ah, that I will, if I can, my own."

"You can."

"Then tell me how."

"Be my wife—let us go to the United States together. Dearest, my patents are a great success. We are making our fortune, though we risk our lives. In America I could sell these inventions for a large sum, or work them myself at an enormous profit. Be my wife, and let us fly this hellish place together."

"And so I would in a moment; but" (with a deep sigh) "papa would never consent to that."

"Dispense with his consent."

"Oh, Henry; and marry under my father's curse!"

"He could not curse you, if he love you half as well as I do; and if he does not, why sacrifice me, and perhaps my life, to him?"

"Henry, for pity's sake, think of some other way. Why this violent haste to get rich? Have a little patience. Mr. Raby will not always be abroad. Oh, pray give up Mr. Bolt, and go quietly on at peace with these dreadful Trades. You know I'll wait all my life for you. I will implore papa to let you visit me oftener. I will do all a faithful, loving girl can do to comfort you."

"Ay," said Henry, bitterly, "you will do anything but the one thing I ask."

"Yes, anything but defy my father. He is father and mother both to me. How unfortunate we both are! If you knew what it costs me to deny you anything, if you knew how I long to follow you round the world—"

She choked with emotion, and seemed on the point of yielding, after all.

But he said, bitterly, "You long to follow me round the world, and you won't go a twelve-days' voyage with me to save my life. Ah, it is always so. You don't love me as poor Jael Dence loves me. She saved my life without my asking her; but you won't do it when I implore you."

"Henry, my own darling, if any woman on earth loves you better than I do, for God's sake marry her, and let me die to prove I loved you a little."

"Very well," said he, grinding his teeth. "Next week I leave this place with a wife. I give you the first offer, because I love you. I shall give Jael the second, because she loves me."

So then he flung out of the room, and left Grace Carden half fainting on the sofa, and drowned in tears.

But before he got back to the works he repented his violence, and his heart yearned for her more than ever.

With that fine sense of justice which belongs to love, he spoke roughly to Jael Dence.

She stared, and said nothing, but watched him furtively, and saw his eyes fill with tears at the picture memory recalled of Grace's pale face and streaming eyes.

She put a few shrewd questions, and his heart was so full he could not conceal the main facts, though he suppressed all that bore reference to Jael herself. She took Grace's part, and told him he was all in the wrong; why could not he go to America alone, and sell his patents, and then come back and marry Grace with the money? "Why drag her across the water, to make her quarrel with her father?"

"Why, indeed?" said Henry: "because I'm not the man I was. I have no manhood left. I have not the courage to fight the Trades, nor yet the courage to leave the girl I love so dearly."

"Eh, poor lad," said Jael, "thou hast courage enough; but it has been too sore tried, first and last. You have gone through enough to break a man of steel."

She advised him to go and make his submission at once.

He told her she was his guardian angel, and kissed her, in the warmth of his gratitude; and he went back to Woodbine Villa, and asked Grace's forgiveness, and said he would go alone to the States and come back with plenty of money to satisfy Mr. Carden's prudence, and—

Grace clutched him gently with both hands, as if to hinder from leaving her. She turned very pale, and said, "Oh my heart!"

Then she laid her head on his shoulder, and wept piteously.

He comforted her, and said, "What is it? a voyage of twelve days! And yet I shall never have the courage to bid you good-by."

"Nor I you, my own darling."

Having come to this resolution, he was now seized with a fear that he would be assassinated before he could carry it out; to diminish the chances, he took up his quarters at the factory, and never went out at night. Attached to the works was a small building near the water-side. Jael Dence occupied the second floor of it. He had a camp-bed set up on the first floor, and established a wire communication with the police office. At the slightest alarm he could ring a bell in Ransome's ear. He also clandestinely unscrewed a little postern door that his predecessors had closed, and made a key to the lock, so that if he should ever be compelled to go out at night he might baffle his foes, who would naturally watch the great gate for his exit.

With all this he became very depressed and moody, and alarmed Doctor Amboyne, who remembered his father's end.

The doctor advised him to go and see his mother for a day or two; but he shook his head, and declined.

A prisoner detained for want of bail is allowed to communicate with his friends, and Grotait soon let Hill know he was very angry with him for undertaking to do Little without orders. Hill said that the job was given him by Cole, who was Grotait's right-hand man, and Grotait had better bail him, otherwise he might be induced to tell tales.

Grotait let him stay in prison three days, and then sent two householders with the bail.

Hill was discharged, and went home. At dusk he turned out to find Cole, and tracing him from one public-house to another, at last lighted on him in company with Mr. Coventry.

This set him thinking; however, he held aloof till they parted; and then following Cole, dunned him for his twenty pounds.

Cole gave him five pounds on account. Hill grumbled, and threatened.

Grotait sent for both men, and went into a passion, and threatened to hang them both if they presumed to attack Little's person again in any way. "It is the place I mean to destroy," said Grotait, "not the man."

Cole conveyed this to Coventry, and it discouraged him mightily, and he told Cole he should give it up and go abroad.

But soon after this some pressure or other was brought to bear on Grotait, and Cole, knowing this, went to him, and asked him whether Bolt and Little were to be done or not.

"It is a painful subject," said Grotait.

"It is a matter of life and death to us," said Cole.

"That is true. But mind—the place, and not the man." Cole assented, and then Grotait took him on to a certain bridge, and pointed out the one weak side of Bob and Little's fortress, and showed him how the engine-chimney could be got at and blown down, and so the works stopped entirely: "And I'll tell you something," said he; "that chimney is built on a bad foundation, and was never very safe; so you have every chance."

Then they chaffered about the price, and at last Grotait agreed to give him L20.

Cole went to Coventry, and told how far Grotait would allow him to go: "But," said he, "L20 is not enough. I run an even chance of being hung or lagged."

"Go a step beyond your instructions, and I'll give you a hundred pounds."

"I daren't," said Cole: "unless there was a chance to blow up the place with the man in it." Then, after a moment's reflection, he said: "I hear he sleeps in the works. I must find out where."

Accordingly, he talked over one of the women in the factory, and gained the following information, which he imparted to Mr. Coventry:

Little lived and slept in a detached building recently erected, and the young woman who had overpowered Hill slept in a room above him. She passed in the works for his sweetheart, and the pair were often locked up together for hours at a time in a room called the "Experiment Room."

This information took Coventry quite by surprise, and imbittered his hatred of Little. While Cole was felicitating him on the situation of the building, he was meditating how to deal his hated rival a stab of another kind.

Cole, however, was single-minded in the matter; and the next day he took a boat and drifted slowly down the river, and scanned the place very carefully.

He came at night to Coventry, and told him he thought he might perhaps be able to do the trick without seeming to defy Grotait's instructions. "But," said he, "it is a very dangerous job. Premises are watched: and, what do you think? they have got wires up now that run over the street to the police office, and Little can ring a bell in Ransome's room, and bring the bobbies across with a rush in a moment. It isn't as it was under the old chief constable; this one's not to be bought nor blinded. I must risk a halter."

"You shall have fifty pounds more."

"You are a gentleman, sir. I should like to have it in hard sovereigns. I'm afraid of notes. They get traced somehow."

"You shall have it all in sovereigns."

"I want a little in advance, to buy the materials. They are costly, especially the fulminating silver."

Coventry gave him ten sovereigns, and they parted with the understanding that Cole should endeavor to blow up the premises on some night when Little was in them, and special arrangements were made to secure this.

Henry Little and Grace Carden received each of them, an anonymous letter, on the same day.

Grace Carden's ran thus:—

"I can't abide to see a young lady made a fool of by a villain. Mr. Little have got his miss here: they dote on each other. She lives in the works, and so do he, ever since she came, which he usen't afore. They are in one room, as many as eight hours at a stretch, and that room always locked. It is the talk of all the girls. It is nought to me, but I thought it right you should know, for it is quite a scandal. She is a strapping country lass, with a queerish name. This comes from a strange, but a well-wisher.

"FAIR PLAY."

The letter to Henry Little was as follows:—

"The reason of so many warnings and ne'er a blow, you had friends in the trade. But you have worn them out. You are a doomed man. Prepare to meet your God.

"[Drawing of coffin.]"

This was the last straw on the camel's back, as the saying is.

He just ground it in his hand, and then he began to act.

He set to work, packed up models, and dispatched them by train; clothes ditto, and wrote a long letter to his mother.

Next day he was busy writing and arranging papers till the afternoon. Then he called on Grace, as related, and returned to the works about six o'clock: he ordered a cup of tea at seven, which Jael brought him. She found him busy writing letters, and one of these was addressed to Grace Carden.

That was all she saw of him that night; for she went to bed early, and she was a sound sleeper.

It was nine o'clock of this same evening.

Mr. Coventry, disguised in a beard, was walking up and down a certain street opposite the great door of the works.

He had already walked and lounged about two hours. At last Cole joined him for a moment and whispered in a tone full of meaning, "Will it do now?"

Coventry's teeth chattered together as he replied, "Yes; now is the time."

"Got the money ready?"

"Yes."

"Let us see it."

"When you have done what you promised me."

"That very moment?"

"That very moment."

"Then I'll tell you what you must do. In about an hour go on the new bridge, and I'll come to you; and, before I've come to you many minutes, you'll see summut and hear summut that will make a noise in Hillsbro', and, perhaps, get us both into trouble."

"Not if you are as dexterous as others have been."

"Others! I was in all those jobs. But this is the queerest. I go to it as if I was going to a halter. No matter, a man can but die once."

And, with these words, he left him and went softly down to the water-side. There, in the shadow of the new bridge, lay a little boat, and in it a light-jointed ladder, a small hamper, and a basket of tools. The rowlocks were covered with tow, and the oars made no noise whatever, except the scarce audible dip in the dark stream. It soon emerged below the bridge like a black spider crawling down the stream, and melted out of sight the more rapidly that a slight fog was rising.

Cole rowed softly past the works, and observed a very faint light in Little's room. He thought it prudent to wait till this should be extinguished, but it was not extinguished. Here was an unexpected delay.

However, the fog thickened a little, and this encouraged him to venture; he beached the boat very gently on the muddy shore, and began his work, looking up every now and then at that pale light, and ready to fly at the first alarm.

He took out of the boat a large varnish-can, which he had filled with gunpowder, and wrapped tightly round with wire, and also with a sash-line; this can was perforated at the side, and a strong tube screwed tightly into it; the tube protruded twelve inches from the can in shape of an S: by means of this a slow-burning fuse was connected with the powder; some yards of this fuse were wrapt loosely round the can.

Cole crept softly to the engine-chimney, and, groping about for the right place, laid the can in the engine bottom and uncoiled the fuse. He took out of his pocket some small pieces of tile, and laid the fuse dry on these.

Then he gave a sigh of relief, and crept back to the boat.

Horrible as the action was, he had done all this without much fear, and with no remorse, for he was used to this sort of work; but now he had to commit a new crime, and with new and terrible materials, which he had never handled in the way of crime before.

He had in his boat a substance so dangerous that he had made a nest of soft cotton for the receptacle which held it; and when the boat touched the shore, light as the contact was, he quaked lest his imprisoned giant-devil should go off and blow him to atoms.

He put off touching it till the last moment. He got his jointed ladder, set it very softly underneath the window where the feeble gas-light was, and felt about with his hands for the grating he had observed when he first reconnoitered the premises from the river. He found it, but it was so high that he had to reach a little, and the position was awkward for working.

The problem was how to remove one of those bars, and so admit his infernal machine; it was about the shape and size of an ostrich's egg.

It must be done without noise, for the room above him was Little's, and Little, he knew, had a wire by means of which he could summon Ransome and the police in the turn of a hand.

The cold of the night, and the now present danger, made Cole shiver all over, and he paused.

But he began again, and, taking out a fine steel saw highly tempered, proceeded to saw the iron slowly and gently, ready at the first alarm to spring from his ladder and run away.

With all his caution, steel grated against steel, and made too much noise in the stilly night. He desisted. He felt about, and found the grating was let into wood, not stone; he oiled the saw, and it cut the wood like butter; he made two cuts like a capital V, and a bar of the grating came loose; he did the same thing above, and the bar came out.

Cole now descended the ladder, and prepared for the greatest danger of all. He took from its receptacle the little metal box lined with glazed paper, which contained the fulminating silver and its fuse; and, holding it as gently as possible, went and mounted the ladder again, putting his foot down as softly as a cat.

But he was getting colder and colder, and at this unfortunate moment he remembered that, when he was a lad, a man had been destroyed by fulminating silver—quite a small quantity—in a plate over which he was leaning; yet the poor wretch's limbs had been found in different places, and he himself had seen the head; it had been torn from the trunk and hurled to an incredible distance.

That trunkless head he now fancied he saw, in the middle of the fog; and his body began to sweat cold, and his hands to shake so that he could hardly told the box. But if he let it fall—

He came hastily down the ladder and sat down on the dirty ground, with the infernal engine beside him.

By-and-by he got up and tried to warm his hands and feet by motion, and at last he recovered his fortitude, and went softly and cat-like up the steps again, in spite of the various dangers he incurred.

Of what was this man's mind composed, whom neither a mere bribe could buy to do this deed, nor pure fanaticism without a bribe; but, where both inducements met, neither the risk of immediate death, nor of imprisonment for life, nor both dangers united, could divert him from his deadly purpose, though his limbs shook, and his body was bedewed with a cold perspiration?

He reached the top of the ladder, he put his hand inside the grate; there was an aperture, but he could not find the bottom. He hesitated.

Here was a fresh danger: if he let the box fall it might explode at once and send him to eternity.

Once more he came softly down, and collected all the tow and wool he could find. He went up the ladder and put these things through the grating; they formed a bed.

Then he went back for the fatal box, took it up the ladder with beating heart, laid it softly in its bed, uncoiled the fuse and let it hang down.

So now these two fiendish things were placed, and their devilish tails hanging out behind them. The fuses had been cut with the utmost nicety to burn the same length of time—twelve minutes.

But Cole was too thoughtful and wary to light the fuses until everything was prepared for his escape. He put the ladder on board the boat, disposed the oars so that he could use them at once; then crept to the engine-chimney, kneeled down beside the fuse, looked up at the faint light glimmering above, and took off his hat.

With singular cunning and forethought he had pasted a piece of sandpaper into his hat. By this means he lighted a lucifer at once, and kept it out of sight from the windows, and also safe from the weather; he drew the end of the fuse into the hat, applied the match to it out of sight, then blew the match out and darted to his other infernal machine. In less than ten seconds he lighted that fuse too; then stepped into the boat, and left those two devilish sparks creeping each on its fatal errand. He pulled away with exulting bosom, beating heart, and creeping flesh. He pulled swiftly up stream, landed at the bridge, staggered up the steps, and found Coventry at his post, but almost frozen, and sick of waiting.

He staggered up to him and gasped out, "I've done the trick, give me the brass, and let me go. I see a halter in the air." His teeth chattered.

But Coventry, after hoping and fearing for two hours and a half, had lost all confidence in his associate, and he said, "How am I to know you've done anything?"

"You'll see and you'll hear," said Cole. "Give me the brass."

"Wait till I see and hear," was the reply.

"What, wait to be nabbed? Another minute, and all the town will be out after me. Give it me, or I'll take it."

"Will you?" And Coventry took out a pistol and cocked it. Cole recoiled.

"Look here," said Coventry; "there are one hundred and fifty sovereigns in this bag. The moment I receive proof you have not deceived me, I give you the bag."

"Here, where we stand?"

"Here, on this spot."

"Hush! not so loud. Didn't I hear a step?"

They both listened keenly. The fog was thick by this time.

Cole whispered, "Look down the river. I wonder which will go off first? It is very cold; very." And he shook like a man in an ague.

Both men listened, numbed with cold, and quivering with the expectation of crime.

A clock struck twelve.

At the first stroke the confederates started and uttered a cry. They were in that state when everything sudden shakes men like thunder.

All still again, and they listened and shook again with fog and grime.

Sudden a lurid flash, and a report, dull and heavy, and something tall seemed to lean toward them from the sky, and there was a mighty rushing sound, and a cold wind in their faces, and an awful fall of masonry on the water, and the water spurted under the stroke. The great chimney had fallen in the river. At this very moment came a sharp, tremendous report like a clap of thunder close at hand. It was so awful, that both bag and pistol fell out of Coventry's hand and rung upon the pavement, and he fled, terror-stricken.

Cole, though frightened, went down on his knees, and got the bag, and started to run the other way.

But almost at the first step he ran against a man, who was running toward him.

Both were staggered by the shock, and almost knocked down.

But the man recovered himself first, and seized Cole with a grip of iron.

When Coventry had run a few steps he recovered his judgment so far as to recollect that this would lay him open to suspicion. He left off running, and walked briskly instead.

Presently the great door of the works was opened, and the porter appeared crying wildly for help, and that the place was on fire.

The few people that were about made a rush, and Coventry, driven by an awful curiosity, went in with them; for why should he be suspected any more than they?

He had not gone in half a minute when Mr. Ransome arrived with several policemen, and closed the doors at once against all comers.

Strange to say, the last explosion had rung the bell in the police-office; hence this prompt appearance of the police.

The five or six persons who got in with Coventry knew nothing, and ran hither and thither. Coventry, better informed, darted at once to Little's quarters, and there beheld an awful sight; the roof presented the appearance of a sieve: of the second floor little remained but a few of the joists, and these were most of them broken and stood on and across each other, like a hedgehog's bristles.

In Little's room, a single beam in the center, with a fragment of board, kept its place, but the joists were all dislocated or broken in two, and sticking up here and there in all directions: huge holes had been blown in the walls of both rooms and much of the contents of the rooms blown out by them; so vast were these apertures, that it seemed wonderful how the structure hung together; the fog was as thick in the dismembered and torn building as outside, but a large gas-pipe in Little's room was wrenched into the form of a snake and broken, and the gas set on fire and flaring, so that the devastation was visible; the fireplace also hung on, heaven knows how.

Coventry cast his eyes round, and recoiled with horror at what he had done: his foot struck something; it was the letter-box, full of letters, still attached to the broken door. By some instinct of curiosity he stooped and peered. There was one letter addressed "Grace Carden."

He tried to open the box: he could not: he gave it a wrench, it was a latticed box, and came to pieces. He went down the stairs with the fragments and the letters in his hand; feet approached, and he heard a voice close to him say, "This way, Mr. Ransome, for God's sake!" A sort of panic seized him; he ran back, and in his desperation jumped on to the one beam that was standing, and from that through the open wall, and fell on the soft mud by the river bank. Though the ground was soft, the descent shook him and imbedded him so deeply he could not extricate himself for some time. But terror lends energy, and he was now thoroughly terrified: he thrust the letters in his pocket, and, being an excellent swimmer, dashed at once into the river; but he soon found it choked up with masonry and debris of every kind: he coasted this, got into the stream, and swam across to the other side. Then taking the lowest and darkest streets, contrived at last to get home, wet and filthy, and quaking.

Ransome and his men examined the shattered building within and without; but no trace could be found of any human being, alive or dead.

Then they got to the river-side with lights, and here they found foot-marks. Ransome set men to guard these from being walked over.

Attention was soon diverted from these. Several yards from the torn building, a woman was found lying all huddled together on a heap of broken masonry. She was in her night-dress, and a counterpane half over her. Her forehead and head were bleeding, and she was quite insensible. The police recognized her directly. It was Jael Dence.

She was alive, though insensible, and Ransome had her conveyed at once to the infirmary.

"Bring more lights to the water-side," said he: "the explosion has acted in that direction."

Many torches were brought. Keen eyes scanned the water. One or two policemen got out upon the ruins of the chimney, and went ankle-deep in water. But what they sought could not be found. Ransome said he was glad of it. Everybody knew what he meant.

He went back to Little's room, and examined it minutely. In the passage he found a card-case. It was lying on the door. Ransome took it up mechanically, and put it in his pocket. He did not examine it at this time: he took for granted it was Little's. He asked one of his men whether a man had not been seen in that room. The officer said, "Yes."

"Did he come down?"

"No; and I can't think how he got out."

"It is plain how he got out; and that accounts for something I observed in the mud. Now, Williams, you go to my place for that stuff I use to take the mold of footprints. Bring plenty. Four of you scour the town, and try and find out who has gone home with river-mud on his shoes or trousers. Send me the porter."

When the porter came, he asked him whether Mr. Little had slept in the works.

The porter could not say for certain.

"Well, but what was his habit?"

"He always slept here of late."

"Where did you see him last?"

"I let him into the works."

"When?"

"I should think about seven o'clock."

"Did you let him out again?"

"No, Mr. Ransome."

"Perhaps you might, and not recollect. Pray think."

The porter shook his head.

"Are you sure you did not let him out?"

"I am quite sure of that."

"Then the Lord have mercy on his soul!"



CHAPTER XXXIII.

That was Grace Carden's first anonymous letter. Its contents curdled her veins with poison. The poor girl sat pale and benumbed, turning the letter in her hand, and reading the fatal words over and over again.

There was a time when she would have entirely disbelieved this slander; but now she remembered, with dismay, how many things had combined to attach Henry to Jael Dence. And then the letter stated such hard facts; facts unknown to her, but advanced positively.

But what terrified her most was that Henry had so lately told her Jael Dence loved him best.

Yet her tossed and tortured mind laid hold of this comfort, that not the man only, but the woman too, were loyal, faithful spirits. Could they both have changed? Appearances are deceitful, and might have deceived this anonymous writer.

After hours of mere suffering, she began to ask herself what she should do?

Her first feminine impulse was to try and find out the truth without Henry's aid.

But no; on second thoughts she would be open and loyal, show Henry the letter, and ask him to tell her how much truth, if any, there was in it.

The agony she endured was a lesson to her. Now she knew what jealousy was; and saw at once she could not endure its torments. She thought to herself he was quite right to make her dismiss Mr. Coventry, and he must dismiss Jael; she should insist on it.

This resolution formed, she lived on thorns, awaiting Henry Little's next visit.

He came next day, but she was out.

She asked the servant if he had said anything.

The servant said, "He seemed a good deal put out at first, miss, but afterward he said, 'No, it was all for the best.'"

This was another blow. Grace connected these words of Henry in some mysterious way with the anonymous letter, and spent the night crying: but in the morning, being a brave, high-spirited girl, she resolved to take a direct course; she would go down to the works, and request an explanation on the premises. She would see the room where Henry was said to pass so many hours with Jael, and she would show him that the man she loved, and lived for, must place himself above suspicion, or lose her forever. "And if he quarrels with me for that," she thought, "why, I can die." She actually carried out her resolution, and went early next morning to the works to demand an explanation. She took the letter with her. As she went along she discussed in her own mind how she should proceed, and at last she resolved to just hand him the letter and fix her eye on him. His face would tell her the truth.

She drove up to the great gate; there were a good many people about, talking, in excited groups.

The porter came out to her. She said she wished to see Mr. Little.

The porter stared: the people within hearing left off talking, and stared too, at her, and then at one another.

At last the porter found his voice. "Mr. Little! why, we can't find him anywhere, dead or alive."

Just then Ransome came out, and, seeing Miss Carden, gave a start, and looked much concerned.

Grace noticed this look, and her own face began to fill with surprise, and then with alarm. "Not to be found!" she faltered.

She did not know Mr. Ransome, but he knew her; and he came to the carriage-window and said, in a low voice, "Miss Carden, I am the chief-constable. I would advise you to return home. The fact is, there has been an explosion here, and a young woman nearly killed."

"Poor creature! But Mr. Little! Oh, sir! Oh, sir!"

"We can't find him," said Ransome, solemnly: "and we fear—we sadly fear—"

Grace uttered a low cry, and then sat trembling.

Ransome tried to console her; said it was just possible he might have not slept in the works.

The porter shook his head.

Grace sprung from the carriage. "Show me the place," said she, hoarsely.

Ransome demurred. "It is an ugly sight for any one to see."

"Who has a better right to see it than I? I shall find him if he is there. Give me your arm: I have heard him speak of you."

Then Ransome yielded reluctantly, and took her to the place.

He showed her Henry's room, all rent and mutilated.

She shuddered, and, covering her face with her hands, leaned half fainting against her conductor; but soon she shook this off, and became inspired with strange energy, though her face was like marble.

She drew him, indeed almost dragged him, hither and thither, questioning him, and listening to everybody's conjectures; for there were loud groups here of work-people and towns-people.

Some thought he was buried under the great chimney in the river, others intimated plainly their fear that he was blown to atoms.

At each suggestion Grace Carden's whole body winced and quivered as if the words were sword cuts, but she would not be persuaded to retire. "No, no," she cried, "amongst so many, some one will guess right. I'll hear all they think, if I die on the spot: die! What is life to me now? Ah! what is that woman saying?" And she hurried Ransome toward a work-woman who was haranguing several of her comrades.

The woman saw Ransome coming toward her with a strange lady.

"Ah!" said she, "here's the constable. Mr. Ransome, will ye tell me where you found the lass, yesternight?"

"She was lying on that heap of bricks: I marked the place with two pieces of chalk; ay, here they are; her head lay here, and her feet here."

"Well, then," said the woman, "he will not be far from that place. You clear away those bricks and rubbish, and you will find him underneath. She was his sweetheart, that is well known here; and he was safe to be beside her when the place was blown up."

"No such thing," said Ransome, angrily, and casting a side-look at Grace. "She lay on the second floor, and Mr. Little on the first floor."

"Thou simple body," said the woman. "What's a stair to a young man when a bonny lass lies awaiting him, and not a soul about? They were a deal too close together all day, to be distant at night."

A murmur of assent burst at once from all the women.

Grace's body winced and quivered, but her marble face never stirred, nor did her lips utter a sound.

"Come away from their scandalous tongues," said Ransome, eagerly.

"No," said Grace; and such a "No." It was like a statue uttering a chip of its own marble.

Then she stood quivering a moment; then, leaving Ransome's arm, she darted up to the place where Jael Dence had been found.

She stood like a bird on the broken masonry, and opened her beautiful eyes in a strange way, and demanded of all her senses whether the body of him she loved lay beneath her feet.

After a minute, during which every eye was riveted on her, she said, "I don't believe it; I don't feel him near me. But I will know."

She took out her purse full of gold, and held it up to the women. "This for you, if you will help me." Then, kneeling down, she began to tear up the bricks and throw them, one after another, as far as her strength permitted. The effect on the work-women was electrical: they swarmed on the broken masonry, and began to clear it away brick by brick. They worked with sympathetic fury, led by this fair creature, whose white hands were soon soiled and bloody, but never tired. In less than an hour they had cleared away several wagon-loads of debris.

The body of Henry Little was not there.

Grace gave her purse to the women, and leaned heavily on Mr. Ransome's arm again. He supported her out of the works.

As soon as they were alone, she said, "Is Jael Dence alive or dead?"

"She was alive half an hour ago."

"Where is she?"

"At the hospital."

"Take me to the hospital."

He took her to the hospital, and soon they stood beside a clean little bed, in which lay the white but still comely face of Jael Dence: her luxuriant hair was cut close, and her head bandaged; but for her majestic form, she looked a fair, dying boy.

"Stand back," said Grace, "and let me speak to her." Then she leaned over Jael, where she lay.

Gentle women are not all gentleness. Watch them, especially in contact with their own sex, and you shall see now and then a trait of the wild animal. Grace Carden at this moment was any thing but dove-like; it was more like a falcon the way she clutched the bedclothes, and towered over that prostrate figure, and then, descending slowly nearer and nearer, plunged her eyes into those fixed and staring orbs of Jael Dence.

So she remained riveted. Had Jael been conscious, and culpable, nothing could have escaped a scrutiny so penetrating.

Even unconscious as she was, Jael's brain and body began to show some signs they were not quite impervious to the strange magnetic power which besieged them so closely. When Grace's eyes had been close to hers about a minute, Jael Dence moved her head slightly to the left, as if those eyes scorched her.

But Grace moved her own head to the right, rapid as a snake, and fixed her again directly.

Jael Dence's bosom gave a heave.

"Where—is—Henry Little?" said Grace, still holding her tight by the eye, and speaking very slowly, and in such a tone, low, but solemn and commanding; a tone that compelled reply.

"Where—is—Henry Little?"

When this was so repeated, Jael moved a little, and her lips began to quiver.

"Where—is—Henry Little?"

Jael's lips opened feebly, and some inarticulate sounds issued from them.

"Where—is—Henry Little?"

Jael Dence, though unconscious, writhed and moaned so that the head nurse interfered, and said she could not have the patient tormented.

Ransome waved her aside, but taking Grace Carden's hand drew her gently away.

She made no positive resistance; but, while her body yielded and retired, her eye remained riveted on Jael Dence, and her hand clutched the air like a hawk's talons, unwilling to lose her prey, and then she turned so weak, Ransome had to support her to her carriage.

As Grace's head sunk on Ransome's shoulder, Jael Dence's eyes closed for the first time.

As Ransome was lifting Grace Carden into the carriage, she said, in a sort of sleepy voice, "Is there no way out of these works but one?"

"Not that I know of; but I will go at once and see. Shall he drive you home?"

"Yes. No—to Dr. Amboyne."

Dr. Amboyne was gone to Woodbine Villa.

She waited in his study, moving about the room all the time, with her face of marble, and her poor restless hands.

At last the doctor returned: they told him at the door Miss Carden was there; he came in to her with both hands extended, and his face working with emotion.

She fell sobbing into his arms; sobbing, but not a tear.

"Is there any hope?"

"I have one. May he not have left the country in a fit of despair? He often threatened. He talked of going to the United States."

"So he did. Ah, he called on me yesterday afternoon. Might not that have been to bid me good-by?"

She looked so imploringly in Dr. Amboyne's face that he assented, though full of doubt.

And now there was a ring at the bell, and Mr. Ransome came to say there was a little postern gate by which Mr. Little might possibly have gone out and the porter not seen him; and, what was more, this gate, by all accounts, had been recently opened: it was closed before Bolt and Little took the premises.

Mr. Ransome added that he should now make it his business to learn, if possible, whether it had been opened by Mr. Little's orders.

Grace thanked him earnestly, and looked hopeful; so did Dr. Amboyne.

"But, doctor," said Grace, "if he has gone away at all, he must have told somebody. Even if there was nobody he loved, he would tell—ah! Mr. Bolt!!"

"You are right. Let us go to him at once."

They found Mr. Bolt in quite a different frame of mind from their own; he was breathing vengeance. However, he showed some feeling for Grace, and told the doctor plainly he feared the worst. Little had been downhearted for some time, and at last he (Bolt) had lost patience with him, and had proposed to him to take an annual payment of nine hundred pounds instead of a share, and leave the concern. Little had asked two days to consider this proposal. "Now," argued Bolt, "if he meant to leave England, he could not do better than take my offer: and he would have taken it before he left. He would have called, or else sent me a letter. But no; not a word! It's a bad job: I'm fond of money, but I'd give a few thousands to see him alive again. But I don't think I ever shall. There are five hundred thousand bricks of ours in that river, and a foot and a half of mud."

While they were both shuddering at this dark allusion, he went off into idle threats, and Grace left him, sick and cold, and clinging to Dr. Amboyne like a drowning woman.

"Have courage," said Dr. Amboyne. "There is one chance left us. His mother! I will telegraph to Aberystwith."

They drove together to the telegraph-office, and sent a telegram. The doctor would not consent to frighten Mrs. Little to death. He simply asked whether her son had just visited or written to her. The answer was paid for; but four hours elapsed, and no answer came.

Then Grace implored the doctor to go with her to Aberystwith. He looked grave, and said she was undertaking too much. She replied, almost fiercely, that she must do all that could be done, or she should go mad.

"But your father, my dear!"

"He is in London. I will tell him all when he returns. He would let me go anywhere with you. I must go; I will!"

At four o'clock they were in the train. They spoke to each other but little on the way; their hearts were too full of dire forebodings to talk about nothings. But, when they were in the fly at Aberystwith, going from the station to Mrs. Little's lodgings, Grace laid her head on her friend's shoulder and said, "Oh, doctor, it has come to this; I hope he loved his mother better than me." Then came a flood of tears—the first.

They went to Mrs. Little's lodgings. The landlady had retired to bed, and, on hearing their errand, told them, out of the second-floor window, that Mrs. Little had left her some days ago, and gone to a neighboring village for change of air.

Grace and Dr. Amboyne drove next morning to that village, and soon learned where Mrs. Little was. Dr. Amboyne left Grace at the inn, for he knew the sight of her would at once alarm Mrs. Little; and in a matter so uncertain as this, he thought the greatest caution necessary. Grace waited for him at the inn in an agony of suspense. She watched at the window for him, and at last she saw him coming toward her. His head was down, and she could not read his face, or she could have told in a moment whether he brought good news or bad.

She waited for him, erect but trembling. He opened the door, and stood before her, pale and agitated—so pale and agitated she had never seen him before.

He faltered out, "She knows nothing. She must know nothing. She is too ill and weak, and, indeed, in such a condition that to tell her the fatal news would probably have killed her on the spot. All I dared do was to ask her with assumed indifference if she had heard from Henry lately. No, Grace, not for these three days."

He sat down and groaned aloud.

"You love the son," said he, "but I love the mother: loved her years before you were born."

At this unexpected revelation Grace Carden kissed him, and wept on his shoulder. Then they went sadly home again.

Doctor Amboyne now gave up all hopes of Henry, and his anxiety was concentrated on Mrs. Little. How on earth was he to save her from a shock likely to prove fatal in her weak condition? To bring her to Hillsborough in her present state would be fatal. He was compelled to leave her in Wales, and that looked so like abandoning her. He suffered torture, the torture that only noble minds can know. At midnight, as he lay in bed, and revolved in his mind all the difficulties and perils of this pitiable situation, an idea struck him. He would try and persuade Mrs. Little to marry him. Should she consent, he could then take her on a wedding-tour, and that tour he could easily extend from place to place, putting off the evil time until, strong in health and conjugal affection, she might be able to endure the terrible, the inevitable blow. The very next morning he wrote her an eloquent letter; he told her that Henry had gone suddenly off to Australia to sell his patents; that almost his last word had been, "My mother! I leave her to you." This, said the doctor, is a sacred commission; and how can I execute it? I cannot invite you to Hillsborough, for the air is fatal to you. Think of your half-promise, and my many years of devotion, and give me the right to carry out your son's wishes to the full.

Mrs. Little replied to this letter, and the result of the correspondence was this: she said she would marry him if she could recover her health, but THAT she feared she never should until she was reconciled to her brother.

Meantime Grace Carden fell into a strange state: fits of feverish energy; fits of death-like stupor. She could do nothing, yet it maddened her to be idle. With Bolt's permission, she set workmen to remove all the remains of the chimney that could be got at—the water was high just then: she had a barge and workmen, and often watched them, and urged them by her presence. Not that she ever spoke; but she hovered about with her marble face and staring eyes, and the sight of her touched their hearts and spurred them to exertion.

Sometimes she used to stand on a heap of bricks hard by, and peer, with dilated eyes into the dark stream, and watch each bucket, or basket, as it came up with bricks, and rubbish, and mud, from the bottom.

At other times she would stand on the bridge and lean over the battlements so far as if she would fly down and search for her dead lover.

One day as she hung thus, glaring into the water, she heard a deep sigh. She looked up, and there was a face almost as pale as her own, and even more haggard, looking at her with a strange mixture of pain and pity. This ghastly spectator of her agony was himself a miserable man, it was Frederick Coventry. His crime had brought him no happiness, no hope of happiness.

At sight of him Grace Carden groaned, and covered her face with her hands.

Coventry drew back dismayed. His guilty conscience misinterpreted this.

"You can forgive us now," said Grace, with a deep sob: then turned away with sullen listlessness, and continued her sad scrutiny.

Coventry loved her, after his fashion, and her mute but eloquent misery moved him.

He drew nearer to her, and said softly, "Do not look so; I can't bear it. He is not there."

"Ah! How do you know?"

Coventry was silent for a moment, and seemed uneasy; but at last he replied thus: "There were two explosions. The chimney fell into the river a moment before the explosion that blew up the works. So how can he be buried under the ruins of the chimney? I know this from a workman who was standing on the bridge when the explosions took place."

"Bless the tongue that tells me that! Oh, how much wiser you are than the rest of us! Mr. Coventry, pity and forgive a poor girl who has used you ill. Tell me—tell me—what can have become of him?"

Coventry was much agitated, and could not speak for some time, and when he did, it was in a faint voice as of one exhausted by a mental struggle. "Would you rather he was—dead—or—false?"

"Oh false—a thousand times! Prove to me he is not dead, but only false to his poor Grace, and I will bless you on my knees."

Coventry's eye flashed. "Well, then, he was the lover of Jael Dence, the girl who fought for him, and shed her blood for him, and saved his life. The connection was open and notorious."

Grace was silent.

"Many a man has fled from two women, who could have been happy with either of them. I believe that this man found himself unable to play the double game any longer, and that he has fled the country—"

"I pray God it may be so," sobbed Grace.

"—Through remorse, or from dread of exposure. Have patience. Do not kill yourself, and break all our hearts. Take my word for it, you will hear from him in a few days, and he will give your reasons for his strange disappearance—excellent, business-like reasons, but not the true ones: there will not be a word about Jael Dence." This last with a sneer.

Grace turned on him with eyes that literally gleamed: "You hated him living, you slander him dead. Falsehood was not in him: his affection for Jael Dence was no secret. I knew it, and approved it. It was as pure as heaven. His poor mutilated body will soon contradict these vile calumnies. I hate you! I hate you!"

Coventry drew back at first from this burst of ire, but soon he met her glance with one of fiendish bitterness. "You hate me for pitying you, and saying that man is not dead. Well, have your own way, then; he is not false, but dead."

He turned on his heel, and went away.

As for Mr. Carden, he declined to admit that Little was dead, and said his conduct was unpardonable, and, indeed, so nearly resembled madness, that, considering the young man's father had committed suicide, he was determined never to admit him into his house again—at all events as a suitor to Grace.

Mr. Coventry had now taken spacious apartments, and furnished them. He resumed his visits to the club. Mr. Carden met him there, and spoke more confidentially to him than he did to his daughter, and admitted he had grave doubts, but said he was a director of the Gosshawk, and would never, either in public or private, allow that Little was dead unless his body should be found and properly identified.

All this time there was a hot discussion in the journals, and the Saw-grinders' Union repudiated the outrage with horror, and offered a considerable reward.

Outsiders were taken in by this, but not a single manufacturer or workman.

Mr. Holdfast denounced it as a Trade outrage, and Ransome groped the town for evidence.

The latter, however, was rather puzzled one day by an anonymous letter telling him he was all on the wrong tack; it was not a Trade job, but contrived by a gentleman for his private ends. Advantage had been taken of Little being wrong with the Trade; "but," said the letter, "you should look to the head for the motive, not to the hands. One or two saw them together a good many times before the deed was done, and the swell was seen on the very bridge when the explosion took place."

This set Ransome thinking very seriously and comparing notes.

Week after week went by and left the mystery unsolved.

Mr. Coventry saw Mr. Carden nearly every day, and asked him was there no news of Little? The answer was always in the negative, and this surprised Coventry more and more.

When a whole month had elapsed, even he began to fancy strange things, and to nurse wild projects that had never entered his head before. He studied books of medical jurisprudence, and made all manner of experiments. He resumed his intimacy with Cole, and they were often closeted together.

Five weeks had elapsed, and Grace Carden had lost all her feverish energy, and remained passive, lethargic, fearing every thing, hoping nothing, but quivering all day with expectation of the next blow; for what had she left to expect now but sorrow in some form or other?

She often wished to visit Jael Dence again at the hospital; but for some time an invincible repugnance withheld her.

She asked Dr. Amboyne to go instead, and question the unhappy girl.

Dr. Amboyne did so; but Jael was now in a half-stupid condition, and her poor brain not clear enough to remember what she was wanted to remember. Her memory was full of gaps, and, unluckily, one of these gaps embraced the whole period between her battle with Hill and the present time.

At last Grace was irritated, and blamed the doctor for his failure.

She reminded him she had herself magnetized Jael, and had almost made her speak. She resolved to go to the hospital herself. "I'll make her tell me one thing," said she, "though I tear her heart out, and my own too."

She dressed plainly, and walked rapidly down toward the hospital. There were two ways to it, but she chose the one that was sure to give her pain. She could not help it; her very feet dragged her to that fatal spot.

When she drew near the fatal bridge, she observed a number of persons collected on it, looking down in the river at some distance.

At the same time people began to hurry past her, making for the bridge.

She asked one of them what it was.

"Summut in the river," was the reply, but in a tone so full of meaning, that at these simple words she ran forward, though her knees almost gave way under her.

The bridge was not so crowded yet, but that she contrived to push in between two women, and look.

All the people were speaking in low murmurs. The hot weather had dried the river up to a stream in the middle, and, in midstream, about fifty yards from the foot of the bridge, was a pile of broken masonry, which had once been the upper part of Bolt and Little's chimney. It had fallen into water twelve feet deep; but now the water was not above five feet, and a portion of the broken bricks and tiles were visible, some just above, some just under the water.

At one side of this wreck jutted out the object on which all eyes were now fastened. At first sight it looked a crooked log of wood sticking out from among the bricks. Thousands, indeed, had passed the bridge, and noticed nothing particular about it; but one, more observant or less hurried, had peered, and then pointed, and collected the crowd.

It needed but a second look to show that this was not a log of wood but the sleeve of a man's coat. A closer inspection revealed that the sleeve was not empty.

There was an arm inside that sleeve, and a little more under the water one could see distinctly a hand white and sodden by the water.

The dark stream just rippled over this hand, half veiling it at times, though never hiding it.

"The body will be jammed among the bricks," said a by-stander; and all assented with awe.

"Eh! to think of its sticking out an arm like that!" said a young girl.

"Dead folk have done more than that, sooner than want Christian burial," replied an old woman.

"I warrant ye they have. I can't look at it."

"Is it cloth, or what?" inquired another.

"It's a kind of tweed, I think."

"What's that glittering on its finger?"

"It's a ring—a gold ring."

At this last revelation there was a fearful scream, and Grace Carden fell senseless on the pavement.

A gentleman who had been hanging about and listening to the comments now darted forward, with a face almost as white as her own, and raised her up, and implored the people to get her a carriage.

It was Mr. Coventry. Little had he counted on this meeting. Horror-stricken, he conveyed the insensible girl to her father's house.

He handed her over to the women, and fled, and the women brought her round; but she had scarcely recovered her senses, when she uttered another piercing scream, and swooned again.



CHAPTER XXXIV.

Coventry passed a night of agony and remorse. He got up broken and despondent, and went straight to Woodbine Villa to do a good action.

He inquired for Miss Carden. They told him she was very ill. He expressed an earnest wish to see her. The servants told him that was impossible. Nobody was allowed to see her but Dr. Amboyne. He went next day to Dr. Amboyne, and the doctor told him that Miss Carden was dangerously ill. Brain fever appeared inevitable.

"But, sir," said Coventry, eagerly, "if one could prove to her that those were not the remains of Henry Little?"

"How could you prove that? Besides, it would be no use now. She is delirious. Even should she live, I should forbid the subject for many a day. Indeed, none but the man himself could make her believe those remains are not his; and even he could not save her now. If he stood by her bedside, she would not know him."

The doctor's lip trembled a little, and his words were so grave and solemn that they struck to the miserable man's marrow. He staggered away, like a drunken man, to his lodgings, and there flung himself on the floor, and groveled in an agony of terror and remorse.



CHAPTER XXXV.

One day it occurred to Raby he could play the misanthrope just as well at home as abroad, so he returned home.

He found old Dence dead and buried, and Patty Dence gone to Australia with her husband.

He heard Jael was in the hospital. He called at Woodbine villa, and they told him Grace was lying between life and death.

He called on Dr. Amboyne, and found him as sad as he used to be gay. The doctor told him all, and even took him to the town hall, and showed him an arm and part of the trunk of a man preserved in spirits, and a piece of tweed cloth, and a plain gold ring.

"There," said he, "is all that remains to us of your nephew, and my friend. Genius, beauty, courage—all come to this!" He could say no more.

The tears filled Raby's eyes, and all his bitterness melted away. With respect to his sister, he said he was quite willing to be reconciled, and even to own himself in the wrong, if Dr. Amboyne, on reading the correspondence, should think so. Dr. Amboyne said he would come to Raby Hall for that purpose. He communicated this at once to Mrs. Little.

Grace had a favorable crisis, and in a few days more she was out of danger, but in a deplorable state of weakness. Dr. Amboyne ordered her to the sea-side. A carriage was prepared expressly for her, and her father took her there.

Woodbine Villa was put up to let furnished, and it was taken by—Mr. Coventry.

Jael Dence began to recover strength rapidly, but she wore at times a confused look. The very day Grace left for Eastbank she was discharged as cured, and left the hospital. This was in the morning.

In the afternoon Dr. Amboyne, being now relieved of his anxiety as to Grace, remembered he had not been to see this poor girl for some time; so he went to the hospital.

When he heard she was discharged, he felt annoyed with himself for not having paid her closer attention. And besides, Grace had repeatedly told him Jael Dence could make a revelation if she chose. And now, occupied with Grace herself, he had neglected her wishes.

"Where is she gone? do you know?"

One of the nurses said she was gone home.

Another said the patient had told her she should go down to the works first.

"And that is the very last place you should have let her go to," said the doctor. "A fine shock the poor creature will get there. You want her back here again, I suppose!" He felt uneasy, and drove down to the works. There he made some inquiries among the women, and elicited that Jael Dence had turned faint at sight of the place, and they had shown her, at her request, where she had been picked up, and had told her about the discovery of Little's remains, and she had persuaded a little girl to go to the town hall with her.

"Oh, the tongue! the tongue!" groaned Amboyne.

He asked to see the little girl, and she came forward of her own accord, and told him she had gone to the town hall with the lass, "but" (regretfully) "that the man would not show them it without an order from the Mayor."

"IT!"

Dr. Amboyne said he was very glad that common sense had not quite deserted the earth. "And where did you go next?"

"I came back here."

"So I see; but the lass?"

"She said she should go home. 'My dear,' says she, 'there's nobody left me here; I'll go and die among my own folk.' That was her word."

"Poor thing! poor thing! Why—"

He stopped short, for that moment he remembered Raby had said old Dence was dead, and Patty gone to Australia. If so, here was another blow in store for poor Jael, and she weakened by a long illness.

He instantly resolved to drive after her, and see whether she was really in a fit state to encounter so many terrible shocks. If not, he should take her back to the infirmary, or into his own house; for he had a great respect for her, and indeed for all her family.

He drove fast, but he could see nothing of her on the road. So then he went on to Cairnhope.

He stopped at the farm-house. It was sadly deteriorated in appearance. Inside he found only an old carter and his daughter. The place was in their charge.

The old man told him apathetically Jael had come home two hours ago and asked for her father and Patty, and they had told her the old farmer was dead and buried, and Patty gone to foreign parts.

"What, you blurted it out like that! You couldn't put yourself in that poor creature's place, and think what a blow it would be? How, in Heaven's name, did she take it?"

"Well, sir, she stared a bit, and looked stupid-like; and then she sat down. She sat crowded all together like in yon corner best part of an hour, and then she got up and said she must go and see his grave."

"You hadn't the sense to make her eat, of course?"

"My girl here set meat afore her, but she couldn't taste it."

Dr. Amboyne drove to Raby Hall and told Raby. Raby said he would have Jael up to the hall. It would be a better place for her now than the farm. He ordered a room to be got ready for her, and a large fire lighted, and at the same time ordered the best bedroom for Dr. Amboyne. "You must dine and sleep here," said he, "and talk of old times."

Dr. Amboyne thanked him—it was dusk by this time—and was soon seated at that hospitable table, with a huge wood fire blazing genially.

Meantime Jael Dence sat crouched upon her father's grave, stupefied with grief. When she had crouched there a long time she got up, and muttered, "Dead and gone! dead and gone!"

Then she crept up to the old church, and sat down in the porch, benumbed with grief, and still a little confused in her poor head.

She sat there for nearly two hours, and then she got up, and muttered, "Dead and gone—he is dead and gone!" and wandered on the hill desolate.

Her feet wandered, her brain wandered. She found herself at last in a place she recognized. It was Squire Raby's lawn. The moon had just risen, and shone on the turf, and on the little river that went curling round with here and there a deep pool.

She crept nearer, and saw the great bay-window, and a blaze of light behind it.

There she had sung the great Noel with her father; and now he was dead and gone.

There she had been with Henry Little, and seen him recognize his mother's picture; and now he was dead and gone. She had saved his life in vain; he was dead and gone. Every body was dead and gone.