THE WHARF BY THE DOCKS

A Novel

by

FLORENCE WARDEN

Author of "The Mystery of the Inn by the Shore, " etc. 

1896

CHAPTER I. 

SOMETHING AMISS. 

Everybody knows Canterbury, with its Old-World charms and itsostentatious air of being content to be rather behind the times, oflooking down upon the hurrying Americans who dash through its cathedraland take snap-shots at its slums, and at all those busy moderns whocannot afford to take life at its own jog-trot pace. 

But everybody does not know the charming old halls and comfortable, old-fashioned mansions which are dotted about the neighboring country, either nestling in secluded nooks of the Kentish valleys or holding astately stand on the wooded hills. 

Of this latter category was The Beeches, a pretty house of warm, redbrick, with a dignified Jacobean front, which stood upon the highestground of a prettily wooded park, and commanded one of those soft, undulating, sleepy landscapes which are so characteristically English, and of which grazing sheep and ruminating cows form so important afeature. A little tame, perhaps, but very pleasant, very homely, verysweet to look upon by the tired eyes that have seen enough of theactive, bustling world. 

Mr. George Wedmore, of the firm of Wedmore, Parkinson and Bishop, merchants of the city of London, had bought back the place, which hadformerly belonged to his family, from the Jews into whose hands it hadfallen, and had settled there to spend in retirement the latter end ofhis life, surrounded by a family who were not too well pleased toexchange busy Bayswater for what they were flippant enough to call awilderness. 

Dinner was over; and Mr. Wedmore, in a snug easy-chair by thedining-room fire, was waiting for Doctor Haselden, who often looked infor a smoke and a game of chess with the owner of The Beeches. 

A lean, fidgety man, with thin hair and grayish whiskers, Mr. Wedmorelooked less at home in the velveteen suit and gaiters which he persistedin wearing even in the evening, less like the country gentleman it washis ambition to be, than like the care-laden city merchant he at heartstill was. 

On the other side of the table sat his better half, in whom it was easyto see he must have found all the charm of contrast to his ownpersonality. A cheery, buxom woman, still handsome, full of life andfun, she had held for the whole of her married life a sway over her lordand master all the greater that neither of them was conscious of thefact. A most devoted and submissive wife, a most indulgent andaffectionate mother, Mrs. Wedmore occupied the not unenviable positionof being half slave, half idol in her own household. 

The clock struck eight, and the bell rang. 

"There he is! There's the doctor!" cried Mrs. Wedmore, with a beamingnod. Her husband sat up in his chair, and the troubled frown which hehad worn all the evening grew a little deeper. 

"I should like you, my dear, to leave us together this evening, " saidhe. 

Mrs. Wedmore jumped up at once, gathering her balls of wool and bigknitting-needles together with one quick sweep of the arm. 

"All right, dear, " said she, with another nod, giving him an anxiouslook. 

Mr. Wedmore perceived the look and smiled. He stretched out his hand tolay it gently on his wife's arm as she passed him. 

"Nothing about me. Nothing for you to be alarmed about, " said he. 

Mrs. Wedmore hesitated a moment. She had her suspicions, and she woulddearly have liked to know more. But she was the best trained of wives;and after a moment's pause, seeing that she was to hear nothing further, she said, good-humoredly: "All right, dear, " and left the room, just intime to shake hands with Doctor Haselden as she went out. 

Now, while the host found it impossible to shake off the signs of hisold calling, the doctor was a man who had never been able to assumethem. From head to foot there was no trace of the doctor in hisappearance; he looked all over what at heart he was--the burly, good-humored, home-loving, land-loving country gentleman, who lookedupon Great Datton, where his home was, as the pivot of the world. 

However he was dressed, he always looked shabby, and he could never havebeen mistaken for anything but an English gentleman. 

He shook hands with Mr. Wedmore, with a smile. These poor Londoners, trying to acclimatize themselves, amused him greatly. He looked uponthem much as the Londoner looks upon the Polish Jew immigrants--withpity, a little jealousy, and no little scorn. 

"Where's Carlo?" asked he. 

"Oh, Carlo was a nuisance, so I've sent him to the stable, " said Mr. Wedmore, with the slightly colder manner which he instantly assumed ifany grievance of his, however small, was touched upon. 

Carlo was a young retriever, which Mr. Wedmore, in the stern belief thatit was the proper thing in a country house, had encouraged about thehouse until his habits of getting between everybody's legs and helpinghimself to the contents of everybody's plate had so roused the ire ofthe rest of the household that Mr. Wedmore had had to give way to theuniversal prejudice against him. 

The doctor shook his head. Lack of capacity for managing a dog was justwhat one might have expected from these new-comers. 

Mr. Wedmore turned his chair to face that of the doctor, and spoke inthe sharp, incisive tones of a man who has serious business on hand. 

"I've been hoping you would drop in every night for the last fortnight, "said he, "and as you didn't come, I was at last obliged to send for you. I have a very important matter to consult you about. You've brought yourpipe?" The doctor produced it from his pocket. "Well, fill it, andlisten. It's about young Horne--Dudley Horne--that I want to speak toyou, to consult you, in fact. "

The doctor nodded as he filled his pipe. 

"The young barrister I've met here, who's engaged to your elderdaughter?"

"Well, she was all but engaged to him, " admitted Mr. Wedmore, in agrudging tone. "But I'm going to put a stop to it, and I'll tell youwhy. " Here he got up, as if unable to keep still in the state ofexcitement into which he was falling, and stood with his hands behindhim and his back to the fire. "I have a strong suspicion that the youngman's not quite right here. " And lowering his voice, Mr. Wedmore touchedhis forehead. 

"Good gracious! You surprise me!" cried the doctor. "He always seemed tome such a clever young fellow. Indeed, you said so to me yourself. "

"So he is. Very clever, " said Mr. Wedmore, shortly. "I don't supposethere are many young chaps of his age--for he's barely thirty--at theBar whose prospects are as good as his. But, for all that, I have astrong suspicion that he's got a tile loose, and that's why I wanted tospeak to you. Now his father was in a lunatic asylum no less than threetimes, and was in one when he died. "

The doctor looked grave. 

"That's a bad history, certainly. Do you know how the father's maladystarted?"

"Why, yes. It was the effect of a wound in the head received when he wasa young man out in America, in the war with Mexico in '46. "

"That isn't the sort of mania that is likely to come down from father toson, " said the doctor, "if his brain was perfectly sound before, and therecurrent mania the result of an accident. "

"Well, so I've understood. And the matter has never troubled me at alluntil lately, when I have begun to detect certain morbid tendencies inDudley, and a general change which makes me hesitate to trust him withthe happiness of my daughter. "

"Can you give me instances?" asked the doctor, although he began to feelsure that whatever opinion he might express on the matter, Mr. Wedmorewould pay little attention to any but his own. 

"Well, for you to understand the case, I must tell you a little moreabout the lad's father. He and I were very old friends--chums fromboyhood, in fact. When he came back from America--where he went from alad's love of adventure--he made a good marriage from a monetary pointof view; married a wharf on the Thames, in fact, somewhere Limehouseway, and settled down as a wharfinger. He was a steady fellow, and didvery well, until one fine morning he was found trying to cut his throat, and had to be locked up. Well, he was soon out again that time, andthings went on straight enough for eight or nine years, by which time hehad done very well--made a lot of money by speculation--and was thinkingof retiring from business altogether. Then, perhaps it was the extrapressure of his increased business, but, at any rate, he broke outagain, tried to murder his wife that time, and did, in fact, injure herso much that she died shortly afterward. Of course, he had to be shut upagain; and a man named Edward Jacobs, a shrewd Jew, who was hisconfidential clerk, carried on the business in his absence. Now, bothHorne and his wife had had the fullest confidence in this Jacobs, but heturned out all wrong. As soon as he learned, at the end of about twelvemonths, that Horne was coming out again, he decamped with everything hecould lay his hands on; and from the position of affairs you may guessthat he made a very good haul. Well, poor Horne found himself in a mazeof difficulties; in fact, his clerk's fraud ruined him. Everything thatcould be sold or mortgaged had to go to the settlement, and when hisaffairs had been finally put straight, there was only a little bit left, that had been so settled upon his wife that no one could touch it. Hemade a good fight of it for a little while, with the help of a few oldfriends, but, in the end, he broke down again for the third time. But heescaped out of the asylum and went abroad, without seeing his friends orhis child, and a few months afterward the announcement of his death inan American asylum was sent by a correspondent out there. Happily therewere no difficulties about securing the mother's money for the son, andit was enough to educate the boy and to give him a start; but, ofcourse, he had to begin the world as a poor man instead of a rich one. Perhaps that was all the better for him--or so I thought until lately. "

"And what are these signs of a morbid tendency that you spoke of?" askedthe doctor. 

"Well, in the first place, after being almost extravagant in hisdevotion to my daughter, Doreen, he now neglects her outrageously--comesdown very seldom, writes short letters or none. Now, my daughter is notthe sort of girl that a sane man would neglect, " added Doctor Wedmore, proudly. 

"Certainly not, " assented the doctor, inwardly thinking that it was muchless surprising than it would have been in the case of one of his owngirls. 

"In the second place, he is always harping upon the subject of Jacobsand his peculations--an old subject, which he might well let rest. And, in the third place, he has become moody, morose and absent-minded; andmy son, Max, who often visits him at his chambers in Lincoln's Inn, hasnoticed the change even more than I, who have fewer opportunities ofseeing him. "

The doctor was puffing stolidly at his pipe and looking at the fire. 

"It is very difficult to form an opinion upon report only, " said he. "Frankly, I can see nothing in what you have told me about the young manwhich could not be explained in other and likelier ways. He may have gotentangled, for instance, with some woman in London. "

Mr. Wedmore took fire at this suggestion. 

"In that case, the sooner Doreen forgets all about him the better. "

"Mind, I'm only suggesting!" put in the doctor, hastily. "There may be adozen more reasons--"

"I shall not wait to find them out, " said Mr. Wedmore, decisively. "Heand Max are coming down together this evening. My wife would have themto help in organizing some affair they're getting up for Christmas. I'llsend him to the right-about without any more nonsense. "

"But surely that is hardly--"

"Hardly what?" snapped out Mr. Wedmore, as he poked the fire viciously. 

"Well, hardly fair to either of the young people. Put a few questions tohim yourself, or better still, let your wife do it. It may be only astorm in a teacup, after all. Remember, he is the son of your oldfriend. And you wouldn't like to have it on your conscience that you hadtreated him harshly. "

The doctor's advice was sane and sound enough, but Mr. Wedmore was notin the mood to listen to it. That notion of an entanglement with anotherwoman rankled in his proud mind, and made him still less inclined to bepatient and forbearing. 

"I shall give Doreen warning of what I am going to do at once, " said he, "before Horne turns up. "

The doctor shrugged his shoulders. He was obstinate himself. 

Mr. Wedmore crossed the long room to the door, and opened it sharply. 

The hall was full of people and of great bales of goods, which werepiled upon the center-table and heaped up all around it. 

"Doreen!" he called, sharply. 

Out of the crowd there rushed a girl--such a girl! One of those radiantcreatures who explain the cult of womanhood; who make it difficult evenfor sober-minded, middle-aged men and matrons to realize that this isnothing but flesh and blood like themselves; one of those beautifulcreatures who claim worship as a right and who repay it with kindnessand brightness and sweetness and laughter. 

No house was ever dull that held Doreen Wedmore. 

She was a tall girl, brown-haired, brown-eyed, made to laugh and to livein the sunshine. Nobody could resist her, and nobody ever tried to. 

She sprang across the hall to her father and whirled him back into thedining-room, and put her back against it. 

"Dudley's come!" said she. "He's in the hall--among the blankets!"

"Blankets!"

"Yes. " She was crossing the room by this time to the doctor, whom shehad quickly perceived, and was holding out her hand to him. "You mustknow, doctor, that we are up to our eyes in blankets just now, and inbundles of red flannel, and in soup and coals. Papa has been reading upChristmas in the country in the olden time, and he finds that to becorrect you must deluge the neighborhood with those articles. They arenot at all what the people want, as far as I can make out. But thatdoesn't matter. It pleases papa to demoralize the neighborhood; so we'redoing it. And mamma helps him. She dates from the prehistoric periodwhen a wife _really_ swore to obey her husband; so she does it throughthick and thin. Of course, she knows better all the time. She couldalways set papa right if she chose. Whatever happens, papa must beobeyed. So when he wants to run his dear old head into a noose, shedutifully holds it open for him, when all the time she knows howuncomfortable he'll be till he gets out. "

"You're a saucy puss, Miss!" cried her father, trying to frown, butbetraying his delight in his daughter's merry tongue by the twinkle inhis eyes. 

"And that's the right sort of woman for a wife, " said the old doctor, enthusiastically. "I must say I think it's a bad sign when young girlsthink they can improve upon their own mothers. "

"She doesn't mean half she says, " said her father, indulgently. 

"Oh, yes, she does, " retorted Doreen. "And she wants to know, please, what it is you have to say to Dudley. "

The doctor rose from his chair, and Mr. Wedmore frowned. 

"And it's no use putting me off by telling me not to ask questions. I'mnot mamma, you know. "

"I intend to ask him--something about you. "

It was the girl's turn to frown now. 

"Please don't, papa, " said she, in a lower voice. "I know you're goingto worry him, and to put your hands behind your back and ask himconundrums, and to make all sorts of mischief, under the impression thatyou are putting things right. And if you only just wouldn't, everythingwould soon be as right as possible. While if you persist--"

But Mr. Wedmore interrupted her, not harshly, as he would have doneanybody else, but with decision. 

"You must trust me to know best, my dear. It is better for you both thatwe should come to some understanding. Haselden, you'll excuse me forhalf an hour, won't you? And you, Doreen, " and he turned again to hisdaughter, "stay with the doctor here, and try to talk sense till I comeback again. "

And Mr. Wedmore went quickly out of the room, without giving the girl achance of saying anything more. 

CHAPTER II. 

MAX MAKES A DISCOVERY. 

Doreen's bright face lost a little of its color and much of its gayetyas her father disappeared. The doctor felt sorry for her. 

"Come, come; cheer up, my dear, " he said. "If he loves you honestly, andI don't know how he can fail to do so, a few words with your father willput matters all right. There is nothing to look so sad about, I think. "

But Doreen gave him one earnest, questioning look, and then her eyelidsfell again. 

"You don't know, " she said, in a low voice. "Papa doesn't understandDudley; but I think I do. He is very sensitive and rather reserved abouthimself. If papa interferes now, he will offend him, and Dudley may verylikely go off at once, and perhaps never come near me again. He isproud--very proud. "

"But if he could behave like that, " replied the doctor, quickly, "if hecould throw over such a nice girl as you for no reason worth speakingof, I should call him a nasty-tempered fellow, whom you ought to be gladto be rid of. "

"Ah, but you would be wrong, " retorted Doreen, with a little flush inher face. "It is quite true that he has neglected me a little lately, written short letters, and not been down to see me so often. But I amsure there was some better reason for his conduct than papa thinks. Andif I feel so sure, and if I am ready to trust him, why shouldn't papabe?"

The doctor smiled at her ingenuousness. 

"Your father is right in claiming that he ought to be made acquaintedwith the young man's reason for conduct which looks quite unwarrantableon the face of it, " said he. 

But Doreen gave a little sigh. 

"I don't think that a man has a right to turn inquisitor over anotherman, just because the second man is ready to marry the first man'sdaughter, " said she. "And I'm sure papa wouldn't have stood it when_he_ was young. "

The doctor laughed. 

"He ought to put up with any amount of questioning rather than lose thegirl of his choice, " said he decisively. "And if he has the stuff of aman in him he will do so. "

"But he is unhappy. I know it, " said Doreen. 

"Unhappy!" cried the doctor, indignantly. "And what's he got to beunhappy about, I should like to know? He ought to be thanking Heaven onhis knees all day long for getting such a nice girl to promise to marryhim. That's the attitude a young man used to take when I was young. "

"Did you go down on your knees all day long when Mrs. Haselden promisedto marry you?" asked Doreen, recovering her sauciness at the notion. "And why should he do it till he knows what sort of a wife I am going tomake? And why should he go down on his knees more than I on mine? Whenthere are more women in the world than men, too!"

The doctor shook his head. 

"Ah, there is no arguing with you saucy girls, " said he. "But I knowthat I, for my part, don't know of a man in the whole world who isworthy to marry one of my daughters. "

As the doctor finished speaking, the door was opened quickly, and Mr. Wedmore came in, looking white and worried. 

Doreen ran to him with an anxious face. 

"What have you done, papa, what have you done? Did you see him? What didyou say? What did you say?"

Mr. Wedmore put his arm around his daughter, and kissed her tenderly. 

"Don't trouble your head about him any more, my dear child, " said he ina husky voice. "He isn't worth it. He isn't worthy of you. "

Doreen drew away from her father, looking into his face with searchingeyes and with an expression full of fear. 

"Papa, what do you mean? You have sent him away?"

Mr. Wedmore answered in a loud and angry voice; but it was clear enoughthat the anger was not directed against his daughter. 

"I did not send him away. He took himself off. I had hardly begun tospeak to him--and I began quite quietly, mind--when he made the excuseof a letter which he found waiting for him, to go back to town. Withoutany ceremony, he rushed out of the study into the hall, and snatched uphis hat and coat to go. "

"And is he gone?" asked Doreen, in a low voice, as she staggered back astep. 

"Oh, yes, I suppose so. And a good riddance, too. There was no letter atall for him, I suppose. "

"Yes, there was a letter!" faltered Doreen. 

She gave a glance round her; seemed to remember suddenly the presence ofa third person, for she blushed deeply on meeting the doctor's eyes;then, without another word, she sprang across the room to the door. 

"Where are you going?" cried her father, as he followed her into thehall. 

But she did not answer. The hall-door was closing with a loud clang. 

Doreen was not the girl to lose her lover for want of a little energy. She was fonder of Dudley than people imagined. There is always aninclination in the general mind to consider that a person of livelytemperament is incapable of a deep feeling. And Mr. Wedmore had onlyshown a common tendency in believing that his beautiful and brilliantdaughter would easily give up the lover whom he considered unworthy ofher. But he was wrong. Much too high-spirited and too happy in hertemperament and surroundings to brood over her lover's late negligence, she was perhaps too vain to believe that she had lost her hold upon hisheart. At any rate, she liked him too well to give him up in thisoff-hand fashion without making an effort to discover the reason of hispresent mysterious conduct. 

That letter which he had used as an excuse for his sudden departure hadarrived at The Beeches by the afternoon post. Doreen had seen it withher own eyes; had noted with some natural curiosity that the directionwas ill-spelled, ill-written; that the chirography was that of an almostilliterate female correspondent; and that the post-mark showed that itcame from the East End of London. Rather a strange letter for the smartyoung barrister to receive, perhaps. And the thought of it made Doreenpause when she had got outside the door on the broad drive between thelawns. 

Only for the moment. The next she was flying across the rougher grassoutside the garden among the oaks and the beeches of the park. She sawno one in front of her, and for a few seconds her heart beat very fast. She thought she had missed him. 

There was no lodge at the park entrance; only a modest wooden gate inthe middle of the fence. Doreen was hesitating whether to go through orto go back, when she saw the figure of Dudley Horne coming toward thegate from the stables. 

So she waited. 

As he came nearer, she, hidden from his sight by the trunk of an oldoak-tree, grew uneasy and shy. Dark though it was, dimly as she couldsee him, Doreen felt convinced, from the rapid, steady pace at which hewalked, that he was intent upon some set purpose, that he was not drivenby pique at her father's words. 

He came quite close to her, so that she saw his face. Adark-complexioned, strong face it was, clean-shaven, not handsome atall. But, on the other hand, it was just such a face as women admire;full of character, of ambition, of virility. Doreen had been debatingwith herself whether she dared speak to him; but the moment she got afull look at his face, her courage died away. 

It was plain to her that, whatever might be the subject of the thoughtswhich were agitating his mind, she had no share in them. 

So she let him pass out, and then crept back, downcast, shocked, ashamed, up the slope to the house. 

She got in by the billiard-room, at the window of which she knocked. Max, her brother, who was playing a game with Queenie, his youngersister, let her in, and cried out at sight of her white face:

"Hello! Doreen, what's up? Had a row with Dudley? Or what?"

"I have had no 'row' with any one, " answered the girl, very quietly. "But--you must all know all about it presently, so you may as well hearit at once--Dudley has gone away. "

"What?"

Max stopped in the act of trying for a carom, and stared at his sister. 

"Why, he only came when I did, ten minutes ago!"

"He's gone, I tell you!" repeated Doreen, stamping her foot. "And--andlisten, Max, I'm frightened about him! He's got something on his mind. When he went away, I saw him; I was standing by the gate; he lookedso--so _dreadful_ that I didn't dare to speak to him. _I!_ Think ofthat!"

"Had papa been speaking to him?" put in the shrewd younger sister, whowas chalking her cue at the other end of the room. 

The younger sister always sees most of the game. 

"Ye--es, but--I don't know--I hardly think it was that, " answered Doreenquickly. "At any rate, Max, I want you to do this for me; I want you togo up to town to-morrow and see him. I shan't rest until I knowhe's--he's all right--after what I saw of his face and the look on it. Now, you will do this, won't you, won't you? Without saying anything toanybody, mind. Queenie, you can hold your tongue, too. Now, Max, there'sa dear, you'll do it, won't you?"

Max told her that she was "off her head, " that he could do no good, andso on. But he ended in giving way to the will of his handsome sister, whom he adored. 

Max Wedmore was a good-looking fellow of five-and-twenty, with areputation as a ne'er-do-weel, which, perhaps, he hardly deserved. Hisfather had a great idea of bringing the young man up to some usefulcalling to keep him out of mischief. Not very terrible mischief, for themost part: only the result of too much leisure and too much money ininexperienced hands. The upshot of this difference of opinion betweenfather and son was that while Mr. Wedmore was always finding mercantilesituations for his son, Max was always taking care to be thrown out ofthem after a few weeks, and taking a rest which was by no means wellearned. 

This errand of his sister's was by no means unwelcome to him, since ittook him back to town, where he could amuse himself better than he couldin the country. 

So, on the following morning, he found some sort of excuse to take himup, and started on his journey with the blessings of Doreen, and withvery little opposition from his father, who was subdued and thankful tohave got rid of Dudley with so little trouble. 

It was soon after three when Max arrived at Dudley Horne's chambers inLincoln's Inn. Of course, Dudley was out; so Max scribbled a note forhis friend and left it on the table while he went to the Law Courts tolook for him. Not finding him anywhere about, Max filled up the day inhis own fashion, and returned to Dudley's room at about seven o'clock, when he supposed that his friend would either return to dinner or lookin on his way to dine elsewhere. 

He waited an hour, then went away and filled up his time at amusic-hall, and returned once more at a quarter to eleven. Dudley, so hewas told by the old woman who gave him the information, had not, as faras she knew, been in his rooms since the morning. 

Max, who was a great friend of Dudley's, and could take any liberty hepleased in his precincts, lit the gas and the sitting-room fire, andinstalled himself in an arm-chair with a book. He could not read, however, for he was oppressed by some of Doreen's own fears. He was wellacquainted with all his friend's ways, and he knew that for him to beaway both from his chambers and from the neighborhood of the Courts fora whole day was most unusual with that particularly steady, ploddingyoung man. He began to worry himself with the remembrance that Dudleyhad not been himself of late, that he had been moody, restless andunsettled without apparent cause. 

Finally, Max worked himself into such a state of anxiety about hisfriend that when he at last heard the key turned in the lock of theouter door, he jumped up excitedly and made a rush for the door. 

Before he reached it, however, he heard footsteps in the adjoiningbedroom, the heavy tread of a man stumbling about in the dark, theoverthrowing of some of the furniture. 

Surely that could not be Dudley!

Max stood still at the door, listening. He thought it might be a thiefwho had got hold of the key of the chambers. 

As he stood still, close by the wall, the door which led from the oneroom to the other was thrown open from the bedroom, almost touching himas it fell back; and there staggered into the sitting-room, into thelight thrown by the gas and the fire, a figure which Max could scarcelyrecognize as Dudley Horne. His face was the grayish white of the dead;his eyes were glassy; his lips were parted; while the grime of a Londonfog had left its black marks round his mouth and eyes, giving him anappearance altogether diabolical. He was shaking like a leaf as hestumbled against a chair and suddenly wheeled round to the light. 

Then, unbuttoning his overcoat quickly, he looked down at his clothesunderneath. He passed his hand over them and held it in the light, witha shudder. 

Max uttered a sharp cry. 

The stain on Dudley's hand, the wet patches which glistened on his darkclothes, were stains of blood. 

CHAPTER III. 

DUDLEY EXPLAINS. 

As the cry of horror escaped the lips of Max, Dudley wheeled quicklyround and met his eyes. 

For a moment the two men stood staring at each other without uttering aword. It seemed to Max that his friend did not recognize him; that helooked like a hunted man brought to bay by his pursuer, with the furtiveexpression in his eyes of a creature trying to devise some means ofescape. 

It was the most shocking experience that Max had ever known, and theblood seemed to freeze in his veins as he stood by the table watchinghis friend, trying to conjure back a smile to his own face and look ofwelcome into his own eyes. 

He found his voice at last. 

"Why, Horne, " cried he, and he was angry with himself as he noted thathis voice was hoarse and tremulous, and that he could not manage tobring out his natural tones, "what have you been doing with yourself?I--I've been backward and forward here all day long, and now I've beenwaiting for you ever so long!"

There was a pause. Dudley was still staring at him, but there wasgradually coming over his face a change which showed recognition, followed by annoyance. He drew himself up, and, after a pause, asked, stiffly:

"What did you want with me?"

He spoke more naturally than Max had managed to do, and as the latterreplied, he took out his pocket-handkerchief very calmly and began towipe the stain off his right hand. 

Max shuddered. 

"Why, is it such a very unusual thing for me to drop in upon you and towant to see you?" he asked, with another attempt at his ordinary manner, which failed almost as completely as the first had done. 

There was another short pause. Dudley, without looking again at hisfriend, examined his hand, saw that it was now clean, and replaced thesoiled handkerchief in his pocket. He seemed by this time to bethoroughly at his ease, but Max was not deceived. 

"Of course not, " said Dudley, quickly. "I only meantthat--considering"--he paused, and seemed to be trying to recollectsomething--"considering what took place down at Datton yesterday and howanxious your father seemed to be rid of me--"

"But what has my father got to do with me, as far as you are concerned, Dudley, eh?" said Max. 

There had come upon him suddenly such a strong impression that hisfriend was in some awful difficulty, some scrape so terrible as to makehim lonely beyond the reach of help, that Max, who was a good-heartedfellow and a stanch friend, spoke with something which might almost becalled tenderness:

"We've always been chums, now, haven't we? And a row between you andDoreen, or between you and my father, wouldn't make any difference tome. I--I suppose you don't mean to give me the cold shoulder for thefuture, eh?"

Dudley had turned his back upon him, and was standing on the hearth-rug, looking down at the fire, in an attitude which betrayed to his friendthe uneasiness from which he was suffering. It was an attitude ofconstraint, as different as possible from any in which Max had ever seenhim. 

Another pause. Dudley seemed unable on this occasion to give a simpleanswer to a simple question without taking thought first. At last helaughed awkwardly and half turned toward Max. 

"Why, of course not, " said he, but without heartiness. "Of course not. Though it will be rather awkward, mind, for us to see much of each otherjust at first, after my having got kicked out like that, won't it?"

The tone in which Max answered betrayed considerable surprise andperplexity. 

"Kicked out!" he exclaimed. "My father said he hardly got a word outbefore you took yourself off in a huff. "

Dudley turned round quickly and faced him this time, with a sullen lookof defiance on his dark face. 

"Well, the wise man doesn't wait to be kicked out, " said he. "He removeshimself upon the slightest hint that such a proceeding on his part wouldbe well received. "

"You were a little too quick on this occasion, " replied Max, dryly, "formy father has got himself into hot water, and mother had a fit ofcrying, while Doreen--"

Something made Max hesitate to tell his friend how Doreen had taken hisdesertion. Max himself was ready to stand by his friend, whateverdifficulties the latter might be in. But Doreen, his lovely sister, musthave a lover without reproach. 

At the mention of the girl's name there came a slight change overDudley's face--a change which struck the sensitive Max and touched himdeeply. Dudley took a step in the direction of his bedroom, and pulledout his watch. As he did so a railroad ticket jerked out of his pocketwith the watch and fell to the ground. 

Max saw it fall, but before he could pick it up or draw attention to ithis ideas were diverted by Dudley's next words:

"Well, you '11 excuse me, old chap. I've got to see a friend off by themidnight train to Liverpool. "

As he spoke Dudley turned, with his hand on the door, to cast a glanceat Max. He seemed to be asking himself what he should tell the other. And then he took a step toward his friend and began an explanation, which, as his shrewd eyes told him, Max required. 

"The fact is that I got into the way of a beastly accident at CharingCross just now. Woman run over--badly hurt. Got myself covered withblood. Ugh!"

Max was convinced that the shudder was genuine, although he haddoubts--of which he was ashamed--about the tale itself. 

And how did that explain the proposed journey?

Dudley went on:

"I've only just got time to change my clothes and make myself decent. See you in a day or two. Sorry I can't stay and have a pipe with you andone of our 'hard-times' suppers. "

He was on the point of disappearing into the inner room, when Maxstopped him. 

"Oh, but you can, " said he. "I have something particular to say to you, and I can wait till you come back, if it's two o'clock, and I can bringin the supper myself. "

Dudley frowned impatiently, and again he cast at Max the horrible, furtive look which had been his first greeting. 

"That's impossible, " said he, quickly. "I may have to go on to Liverpoolmyself. Good-night. "

And he shut himself into the bedroom. 

Max felt cold all over. After a few minutes' hesitation, he went out ofthe chambers, down the stairs and out of the house. 

At the door a cab was waiting. The driver spoke to him the moment hestepped out on the pavement. Evidently he took him for Dudley, his latefare. 

"The lady's got out an' gone off, sir. I hollered after her, but shewouldn't wait. Oh, beg pardon, sir, " and the man touched his hat, perceiving his mistake; "I took you for the gentleman I brought herewith the lady. "

"Oh, he'll be down in a minute or two, " answered Max. 

And then he thought he would wait and see what new developments thedisappearance of the lady would lead to. He was getting sick with alarmabout his friend. These instances of the blood-stained clothes, thepossible journey to Liverpool, and the flight of the mysterious lady, were so suspicious, taken in conjunction with each other, that Max foundit impossible to rest until he knew more. He walked a little way alongthe pavement, and then returned slowly in the middle of the road. He haddone this for the third time when Dudley dashed out of the house withrapid steps, and had reached the step of the hansom before he discoveredthat the vehicle was empty. 

An exclamation of dismay escaped his lips, and to the cabman's statementof the lady's disappearance he replied by asking sharply in whichdirection she had gone. On receiving the information he wanted, he gavethe man his fare, and walked rapidly away in the direction the cabmanhad indicated. 

Max followed. 

Every moment increased his belief that some appalling circumstance hadoccurred by which Dudley's mind had for the time lost its balance. Everyword, look and movement on the part of his friend betrayed the fact. Nowhe was evidently setting off in feverish haste in pursuit of this womanwhom he had left in the cab; and Max, who believed that his friend wason the brink of an attack of the insanity which old Mr. Wedmore feared, resolved to dog his footsteps, and not to let his friend go out of hissight until the latter got safely back to his chambers. 

Dudley went at a great pace into Holborn, and then he stopped. Thetraffic had dwindled down to an occasional hansom and to a thin line offoot-passengers on the pavements. He looked to right, to left, and thenhe turned suddenly and came face to face with Max. 

"Hello!" cried he. "Where are you going to? Where are you putting up?"

"At the Arundel, " answered Max, taken aback, and stammering a little. 

Dudley had recovered his usual tones. 

"Come to my club, " said he. "We can get some supper there and have thatpipe. "

"But how about Liverpool and the friend you had to see off?" asked Max. 

Dudley hesitated ever so slightly. 

"Oh, he's given me the slip, " he answered, in a tone which soundedcareless enough. "Gone off without waiting for me. So my conscience isfree on his score. "

Max said nothing for a moment. Then he thought himself justified insetting a trap for his friend. 

"Who is he?" asked he. "Anybody I know?"

"No, " replied Dudley. "A man I met in the country, who showed me a gooddeal of kindness. From Yorkshire. Man named Browning. Very good fellow, but erratic. Said he'd wait for me in the cab, and disappeared before Icould come down. Had an idea I should make him lose his train, Isuppose. Well, never mind him. Come along. "

Max went with him in silence. Dudley had not only got back his usualspirits, but seemed to be in a mood of loquacity and liveliness unusualwith him. When they got to the club, he ordered oysters and a bottle ofchampagne, and drank much more freely than was his custom. 

It was Max, the ne'er-do-weel, the extravagant one, who drank little anddid the listening. Dudley had cast off altogether the gravity andtaciturnity which sometimes got him looked upon as a bit of a prig, andchatted and told his friend stories, with a tone and manner ofirresponsible gayety which became him ill. 

And Max, who was usually the talker, listened as badly as the other toldhis stories. For all the time he was weighed down with the fear, sostrong that it seemed to amount to absolute knowledge, of some horribledanger hanging over his friend. 

Abruptly, before he made the expected comment on the last of Dudley'sstories, Max rose from his chair and said he must go home. 

"I'll see you as far as your diggings first, " said he. "It's not muchout of way, you know. "

At these words Dudley's high spirits suddenly left him, and the furtivelook came again into his face. 

"Oh, " said he, "oh, very well. And on the way I can tell you the wholestory of the accident that I saw at Charing Cross, this evening, justbefore I met you. "

So they went out together, and Dudley, as he had suggested, gave hisfriend a long and extremely circumstantial account of the way in whichthe wheel went over the woman, and of the difficulty he and thepoliceman had experienced in getting her from between the wheels of thevan by which she had been crushed. 

Max heard him in silence, but did not believe a word. Whatever hadreduced Dudley to the plight in which he had returned to his chambers, Max was convinced that it differed in some important details from theversion of the affair which he chose to give. 

"We won't talk any more about it, " he went on, without seeming to remarkhis friend's silence. "It's a thing I want to forget. It has quite upsetme for a time; you could see that yourself when you met me. I--I don'tknow quite what to do to get the thing out of my mind. I think I shallrun down to Datton with you, and see what that will do. What do youthink?"

Now, although he had drunk more wine than usual, Dudley knew perfectlywell what he was saying, and Max stared at him in astonishment. 

"What?" he exclaimed. "After what you told me? About my father?"

"Oh, yes, yes. But I can explain everything. I can, and I will, "returned Dudley, quickly. "I have not been myself lately. I have hadcertain business worries. But they are all settled now, and I feel morelike myself than I have done for weeks. "

Max stopped short and stared at his friend by the light of a gas-lamp. 

"Well, you don't look it, " said he, shortly. 

Dudley laughed loudly, but rather uneasily. 

"Don't you think I could give an explanation which would satisfy yourfather, if I wished?" he asked, with a sudden relapse into gravity. 

"I'm hanged if I know, " retorted Max, energetically. "You haven't givenany explanation which would satisfy _me_. "

Dudley stared into his face for a few seconds inquiringly, and thenquietly hooked his arm and led him along the Strand. 

"You don't want to be satisfied, old chap, " said he, in a low voice. "You know me. "

Again Max was deeply touched. This was a sudden and unexpected peepunder the surface of deception into the real heart of his old chum. Hereplied only by a slight twitching of the arm Dudley had taken. 

They walked on at a quicker pace, and ran up the stairs to the door ofDudley's rooms in silence. 

Dudley went first into the sitting-room and turned up the gas. It didnot escape Max that he shot a hurried glance around the room, taking inevery corner, as he entered. Talking all the time about the cold and thefog, Dudley went into the adjoining room, and Max saw him pull aside thebed-curtains and look behind them. 

Then Max, not wishing to play the spy on his friend, turned his back;and as he did so he caught sight of the railway ticket which had fallento the floor from Dudley's pocket before they went out. 

Max picked it up, and noted that it was the return half of a first-classreturn ticket from Fenchurch Street to Limehouse, and that it was datedthat very day. 

He had scarcely noted this, mechanically rather than with any setpurpose, when he was startled to find Dudley at his elbow. 

Max turned round quickly, but Dudley's eyes were fixed upon the railwayticket. 

"You dropped this when you--" began Max, handing it to his friend. 

It was not until then, when Dudley took the ticket from him and tossedit into the fireplace with a careless nod, that it flashed into the mindof Max that the incident had some significance. 

What on earth had Dudley been doing at Limehouse? His parents had hadproperty there, certainly, many years ago. But not a square foot of thegrimy, slimy, auriferous Thames-side land, not a brick or a beam of thewarehouses and sheds which had been theirs in the old days, haddescended to Dudley. Owing to the fraudulent action of Edward Jacobs, all had had to go. 

CHAPTER IV. 

A PARAGRAPH IN "THE STANDARD. "

Max did not stay long with his friend, but made the excuse that he washalf asleep, after a few minutes' rather desultory conversation, to goback to his hotel. 

It was with the greatest reluctance that he left his friend alone; butDudley had given him intimations, in every look and tone and movement, that he wished to be by himself; and this fact increased the heavinessof heart with which Max, full of forebodings on his friend's account, had gone reluctantly down the creaking stairs. 

Again and again Max asked himself, during his short walk from Lincoln'sInn to Arundel Street, why he had not had the courage to put a questionor two straightforwardly to Dudley. As a matter of fact, however, thereason was simple enough. The relative positions of the two men had beensuddenly reversed, and neither of them, as yet, felt easy under the newconditions. 

Dudley, the hard-working student, the rising barrister, the abstemious, thoughtful, rather silent man to whom Max had looked up with respect andaffection, had suddenly sunk, during the last few hours, by someunaccountable and mysterious means, to far below Max's own modest level. It was he, the careless fellow whom Dudley had formerly admonished, whohad that evening been the sober, the temperate, the taciturn one; it washe who had watched the other, been solicitous for him, trembled for him. 

Max could not understand. He lay awake worrying himself about hisfriend, feeling Dudley's fall more acutely than he would have felt hisown, and did not fall asleep until it was nearly daylight. 

In these circumstances he overslept himself, and it was eleven o'clockbefore he found himself in the hotel coffee-room, waiting for hisbreakfast. 

He was in the act of pouring out his coffee, when his name, utteredbehind him in a familiar voice, made him start. The next moment DudleyHorne stood by his side, and holding out his hand with a smile, seatedhimself on the chair beside him. 

"I--I--I overslept myself this morning, " stammered Max. 

He was in a state of absolute bewilderment. Not only had the new Dudleyof the previous night disappeared, with his alternate depression andfeverish high spirits, his furtive glances, his hoarse and alteredvoice, but the old Dudley, who had returned, seemed happier and livelierthan usual. 

"Town and its wicked ways don't agree with you, my boy, nor do they withme. If I were in your shoes, I shouldn't tread the streets of Babylonmore than once a twelvemonth. "

"You think that now, " returned Max, "because you see more than enough oftown. "

"Well, I'm not going to see much more of it at present, " retortedDudley. "This afternoon I'm off again down to Datton, and I came to askwhether you were coming down with me. "

"I thought you had had a row, at least a misunderstanding of some sort, with--with my father?"

"Why, yes, so I had, " replied Dudley, serenely, as he took a newspaperout of his pocket and folded it for reading. "But I've written to himalready this morning, explaining things, and telling him that I proposeto come down to The Beeches this evening. He'll get it before I turn up, I should think, for I posted it at six o'clock this morning. "

"Why, what were you doing at six o'clock in the morning?" said Max, in atone of bewilderment, as before. "Didn't you go to bed at all lastnight?"

"No, " answered Dudley, calmly. "I had some worrying things to thinkabout, and so I took the night to do it in. "

A slight frown passed over his face as he spoke, but it disappearedquickly, leaving him as placid as before. 

"About one of the things I can consult you, Max. You know somethingabout it, I suppose. Do you think I have any chance with Doreen?"

Max stared at him again. 

"You must be blind if you haven't seen that you have, " he said, at last, in a sort of muffled voice, grudgingly. He moved uneasily in his seat, and added, in a hurried manner: "But, I say, you know, Dudley, afterlast night, I--I want to ask you something myself. I'm Doreen's brother, though I'm not much of a brother for such a nice girl as she is. And--and--what on earth did you think of going to Liverpool for _with awoman_? I've a right to ask that now, haven't I?"

Max blurted out these words in a dogged tone, not deterred fromfinishing his sentence by the fact that Dudley's face had grown whiteand hard, and that over his whole attitude there had come a rapidchange. 

There was a pause when the younger man had finished. Dudley kept hiseyes down, and traced a pattern on the table-cloth with a fork, whileMax looked at him furtively. At last Dudley looked up quickly and asked, in a tone which admitted of no prevarication in the answer he demanded:

"You have been playing the spy upon me, I see. Tell me just how much yousaw. "

It was such a straightforward way of coming to the point that Max, takenaback, but rather thankful that the ground was to be cleared a little, answered at once without reserve:

"I did play the spy. It was enough to make me. I saw the hansom waitingoutside your door last night; the cabman mistook me for you, and told methe lady had walked away. I couldn't help putting that together withwhat you had told me about seeing a friend off to Liverpool, and, perhaps, going there yourself. Now, who could have helped it?"

Dudley did not at once answer. He just glanced inquiringly at the faceof Max while he went on tracing the pattern on the cloth. 

"You didn't see the lady, " he said at last, not in a questioning tone, but with conviction. 

"No. "

"Well, if you had seen her you would have been satisfied that it was nother charms which were leading me astray, " said he, with a faint smile. "Are you satisfied now, or do you still consider, " he went on with aslight tone of mockery in his voice, "that my character requires furtherinvestigation before you can accept me for a brother-in-law?"

Max moved uneasily again. 

"What rot, Horne!" said he, impatiently. "You know very well I've alwayswanted you to marry Doreen. I've said so, lots of times. I still say itwas natural I should want to understand your queer goings-on last night. And now--and now--"

"And now that you don't understand them any better than before, you areready to take it for granted it's all right?" broke in Dudley, with thesame scoffing tone as before. 

Max grew very red, began to speak, glanced at Dudley, and got up. 

"Yes, I suppose that's about the size of it, " said he, stiffly. 

"And are you going down with me to-night? I can catch the seven o'clocktrain. "

"Oh, yes, I suppose so. I'll meet you at Charing Cross. "

Max's enthusiasm on his friend's behalf had been much damped by hisbehavior, and he gave him a nod, turned on his heel and left him withoutanother word. He gave up trying to understand the mystery which hungabout Dudley, and left it to Doreen and to his father to unravel. 

The two young men did not meet again, therefore, until seven thatevening, when they took their seats in the same smoking-carriage. Maxfelt quite glad that the presence of a couple of strangers prevented anytalk of a confidential sort between himself and Dudley, who on his sideseemed perfectly contented to puff at his pipe in silence. 

Dudley's letter had evidently been received, and well received, for atthe station the two friends found the dog-cart waiting to take them themile and a half which lay between the station and The Beeches. 

At the house itself, too, the front door flew open at their approach, and Mr. Wedmore himself stood in the hall to welcome them. 

Queenie was there. Mr. Wedmore was there. But there was never a glimpseof Doreen. 

"I got your letter, my dear boy, " began Mr. Wedmore, holding out hishand with so much heartiness that it was plain he was delighted to beable to forgive his old friend's son, "and I am very glad, indeed, thatyou have found your way back to us so soon. I am heartily glad to hearthat the worries which have been making you depressed lately areover--heartily glad. And so, I am sure, " added he, with a significantsmile, "Doreen will be. "

"Thank you, sir, " said Dudley. "You are very kind, very indulgent. I amnot ungrateful, I assure you. "

Max, behind them, was listening with attentive ears. He did not feel sosure as his father seemed to be that all was now well with Dudley. 

"Where's Doreen?" he asked his younger sister. 

"Don't know, I'm sure. She's taken herself off somewhere. Probablysomebody else will find her quicker than you will. "

The younger sister was right. The younger sister always is on theseoccasions. 

Within five minutes of his arrival, Dudley found his way into thebreakfast room, where Doreen, a pug dog and a raven were sittingtogether on the floor, surrounded by a frightful litter of paper andshavings and string, wooden boxes, hampers, and odds and ends of cottonwool. 

She just looked up when Dudley came in, gave him a glance and a littlecool nod, and then, as he attempted to advance, uttered a shrill littlescream. 

"One step farther, and my wax cupids will be ruined!"

"Wax cupids!" repeated Dudley, feebly. 

"Yes, for my Christmas tree. It's to be the greatest success ever knownin these parts, or the greatest failure. Nothing between. That's what Imust always have--something sensational--something to make people howlat me, or to make them want to light bonfires in my honor. That'scharacteristic, isn't it?"

And Doreen, who was dressed in a black skirt, with a scarlet velvetbodice which did justice to her brilliant complexion and soft, darkhair, paused in the act of turning out a number of glittering glassballs into her lap. 

"Very, " said Dudley, as he made his way carefully to the nearest chairand sat down to look at her. 

He was up to his knees in brown-paper parcels, over which barricade hestretched out his hand. 

Doreen affected not to see it. She began to tie bits of fancy stringinto the little rings in the glass balls, cutting off the ends with apair of scissors. 

"Aren't you going to shake hands with me?" asked Dudley, impatiently. 

Doreen answered without looking tip. 

"No. Not yet. "

"What's the matter now?"

"Oh, I am offended. "

"What have I done now?"

Doreen threw up her head. 

"What have you _not_ done? We have all of us--I among theothers--had a good deal to put up with from you, lately, in the matterof what I will call general neglect. And you put a climax to it the daybefore yesterday by rushing out of the house without a word of good-byeto anybody. "

"There was a reason for it, " interrupted Dudley, quickly. 

"I suppose so. But I'm not going to take the reason on trust, Mr. Horne. "

"Not if you're satisfied that you will meet with no more neglect in thefuture? That my conduct shall be in every respect what you--and theothers--can desire?"

"Not even then, " replied Doreen decisively. 

"But if your father is satisfied?"

"Then go and talk to my father. "

There was a pause and their eyes met. Dudley, who had acknowledged tohimself the patience with which Doreen had put up with his recentneglect, was astonished by the resolution which he saw in her eyes. 

"What is it you want to know?" he asked, in a condescending andindulgent tone. 

"A great deal more than you will tell me, " answered Doreen, promptly. 

Whereat there was another pause. Dudley took up one of the brown-paperparcels and turned it over in his hands. Perhaps it was to hide the factthat an irrepressible tremor was running through his limbs. 

If he had looked at her at that moment he would have seen in her eyes atouching look of sympathy and distress. The girl knew that something hadbeen amiss with him--that something was amiss still. She cared for him. She wanted his confidence, or at least so much of it as would allow herto pour out upon him the tender sympathy with which her innocent heartwas overflowing. And he would have none of it. He wanted to treat herlike a beautiful doll, to be left in its cotton wool when his spiritswere too low for playthings, and to be taken out and admired when thingswent better with him. 

This was what Doreen mutinously thought and what her lips were on thepoint of uttering, when the door was opened by Mr. Wedmore, who cameinto the room with a copy of the _Evening Standard_ in his hand. 

"Look here, Horne, did you see this?" said he, as he folded the paperand handed it to Dudley. "Here's an odd thing. Of course it may be onlya coincidence. But doesn't it seem to refer to the rascal who ruinedyour prospects--Edward Jacobs?"

"A middle-aged Jewish woman, who found some difficulty in makingherself understood, from an impediment in her speech, applied toMr. ----, of ---- Street Police Court, for advice in the followingcircumstances: She and her husband had returned to England inreduced circumstances, after a long residence abroad, and herhusband was in search of employment. He had received a letter fromLimehouse, offering him employment and giving him an appointmentfor yesterday afternoon, which he started to keep. He had notreturned; she had been to Limehouse police station to makeinquiries, but could learn nothing of her husband. She seemed to beunder the impression that he had met with foul play, and made arambling statement to the effect that he had 'enemies. ' It was onlyafter much persuasion, and the assurance that the press could nothelp her without the knowledge, that she gave her name as Jacobs, and her husband's first name as Edward. She described him as of themiddle height, thin, with gray hair and a short gray beard. Themagistrate said he had no doubt the press would do what they couldto help her, and the woman withdrew. "

Dudley Horne read this account, and gave the paper back to Mr. Wedmore. 

He tried to speak as he did so, but, though his mouth opened, the voicerefused to come. 

CHAPTER V. 

ONE MAN'S LOSS is ANOTHER MAN'S GAIN. 

"Confound the Christmas tree!" grumbled Mr. Wedmore, as he stumbled overa parcel of fluffy rabbits, whose heads screwed off to permit theinsertion of sweets. 

"Oh, papa, you'll be saying 'Confound Christmas' next!"

And Doreen, with one watchful eye on Dudley all the time, made a lanethrough her boxes and her hampers to admit the passage of her father toa chair. 

By this time Dudley had recovered himself a little, and was able toanswer the question Mr. Wedmore now put to him. 

"What do you think of that, Horne?"

"I think, sir, that it must be more than a coincidence; that Mrs. Jacobsmust be the wife of the man who was my father's manager. "

"Well, I think so, too. I know Jacobs's wife had an impediment in herspeech. The odd part of the business is that he should have disappearedat Limehouse, the very place where one would have thought he would havean objection to turning up at all, connected as it was with his oldpeculations. I suppose he thought they were forgotten by this time. "

"I suppose so. "

Dudley still looked very white. He took up the paper again, as if tore-read the paragraph. But Doreen, from her post of vantage on thefloor, saw that he held it before him with eyes fixed. Mr. Wedmore, after a little hesitation, and after vainly trying to get another lookat the face of the younger man, went on again:

"I thought you would be struck by this; the subject turning up again inthis odd way, just when you've been interesting yourself so much in theold story!"

Down went the paper, and Dudley looked into the face of Mr. Wedmore. 

"Interesting myself in it! Have I? How do you mean?"

"Well, you've asked a good many questions about this Jacobs, andwondered what had become of him. I fancy you have the answer in thatparagraph. "

There was a pause, and Dudley seemed to recollect something. Then hesaid:

"Oh, yes, I think I have. The man has fallen upon bad times, evidently. I--I--I'm sorry for his wife. "

"And the man himself--haven't you forgiven him yet?"

Dudley started, and glanced quickly round, as if the simple words hadbeen an accusation. 

"Forgiven him? Oh, yes, long ago. At least--" He paused a moment, andthen added, inquiringly: "What had I to forgive?"

"Well, to tell the truth, Horne, that's just what I have often askedmyself, when you have insisted upon raking up all the details of poorJacobs's misdeeds! Why, your poor father, who was ruined by hisdishonesty, never showed half the animosity you do. I could haveunderstood it if you had suffered by his frauds. But have you? You havebeen well educated; you have started well in life. And on the whole, noman who has arrived at your age can honestly say that it would have beenbetter for him to start life with a fortune at his back, eh?"

"No. "

Dudley got up from his chair. He seemed agitated and uneasy, and soontook advantage of Mr. Wedmore's suggestion, somewhat dryly made, that hewas tired after his journey and would like to go to bed. 

When he had left the room, Mr. Wedmore turned angrily to his daughter. 

"Now, Doreen, I will have no more of this nonsense. Dudley is beginningall the old tricks over again--absence of mind, indifference to you--didhe even look at you as he said good night?--and morbid interest in thisold, forgotten business of Jacobs and his misdoings. I won't have anymore of it, and I shall tell him plainly that we don't care to have himdown here until he can bring a livelier face and manner with him!"

Doreen had risen from her humble seat on the floor and had crawled onher knees to the side of his chair, where she slid a coaxing, caressinghand under his arm and put her pretty head gently down on his shoulder. 

"No, you won't, papa dear. You won't do anything of the kind, " shewhispered in his ear very softly, very humbly. "You would not doanything to give pain to your old friend's son if you could help it, andyou would not do anything to hurt your own child, your little Doreen, for a hundred thousand pounds, now would you?"

"Yes, I would, if it was for her good, " replied Mr. Wedmore, in a veryloud and determined voice, which was supposed to have the effect offrightening her into submission. "And it's all rubbish to think to getaround me by calling yourself 'little Doreen, ' when you're a great, big, overgrown lamp-post of a girl, who can take her own part against thewhole county. "

Doreen laughed, but still clung persistently to the arm which hepretended to try to release from her clutches. 

"Well, I don't know about the county, but I think I can persuade my oldfather into doing what I want, " she purred into his ear with gentleconviction. "You see, papa, it isn't as if Dudley and I were engaged. We--"

"Why, what else have you been but engaged ever since last Christmas?"said her father, irritably. "Everybody has looked upon it as anengagement, and Dudley was devoted enough until a couple of months ago;but now something has gone wrong with the lad, I'm certain, and it wouldbe much better for you both to make an end of this. "

"Why, there's nothing to make an end of, " pleaded Doreen. "Just 'letthings slide, ' as Max says, and let Dudley come down or stay away as helikes, and the matter will come quite right one way or the other, andyou will find there was really nothing for you to trouble your dear oldhead about, after all. "

There was really some excellence in the girl's suggestion; and herfather, after much grumbling, gave a half consent to it. He was forcedto admit to himself that there was some grounds for Dudley's agitationon reading the paragraph concerning the disappearance of Edward Jacobs, since he had been interesting himself of late in that person's history. But it was the degree of the young man's agitation which had seemedmorbid. Mr. Wedmore found it difficult to understand why a meresuggestion of the man's disappearance--if it were indeed _the_man--should affect Dudley so deeply. And the idea of incipient insanityin young Horne grew stronger than ever in Mr. Wedmore's mind. 

Now, Doreen was by no means so sanguine as she pretended to be. She wasone of those high-spirited, lively girls who find it easy to hide fromothers any troubles which may be gnawing at their heart. Such a naturehas an elasticity which enables it to throw off its cares for a time, when in the society of others, only to brood over them in hours ofloneliness. 

Nobody in the house knew--what, however, shrewd Queenie half guessedthat Doreen had many an anxious hour, many a secret fit of crying, onaccount of the change in Dudley's manner toward her. The brilliant, proud-hearted girl was more deeply attached to him than anybodysuspected. If any remark was made by outsiders as to the comparativerarity of the young barrister's visits during the past two months, itwas always accompanied by the comment that Miss Wedmore would not belong in consoling herself. 

And everybody knew that the curate, the Rev. Lisle Lindsay, washungering to step into Dudley's shoes. 

He was not quite to be despised as a rival, this "snowy-banded, dilettant, delicate-handed priest. " In the first place, he was a reallynice, honorable young fellow, with no much worse faults than apedantically correct pronunciation of the unaccented vowels; in thesecond place, he was considerably taller than the race of curatesusually runs; and in the third place, he had a handsome allowance fromhis mother, and "expectations" on a very grand scale indeed. MissWedmore, if she were to decide in his favor, might well aspire to be thewife of a bishop some day. And what could woman wish for more?

He was no laggard in love either. On the very morning after the arrivalof Max and Dudley, Mr. Lindsay called soon after breakfast to makeinquiries about the amount of holly and evergreens which would beavailable for the decoration of the church, and was shown into themorning-room, where most of the great work of preparation for Christmaswas taking place. 

Mrs. Wedmore and all the young people were there, Max and Dudley havingbeen pressed into the service of filling cardboard drums with sweets forwhat Max called "the everlasting tree. " The tree itself stood in acorner of the room, a colossal but lop-sided plant with a lamentabletendency to straggle about the lower branches, and an inclination to runto weedy and unnecessary length about the top. 

Max was a hopeless failure as an assistant. He was always possessed witha passionate desire to do something different from what he was asked todo; and when they gave way and indulged his fancy, the fancydisappeared, and he found that he wanted to do something else. 

"It's always the way with a man!" was Queenie's scornful comment on herbrother's failing. 

Queenie herself looked upon the whole business of the tree as a piece ofuseless frivolity unworthy the time and attention of grown-up people. And she went about the share in it which she had been persuaded toundertake with a stolid and supercilious manner which went far to spoilthe enjoyment of the rest. 

Dudley entered, into the affair with some zest, but it was noticeablethat he devoted himself to Queenie, and exchanged very few remarks withDoreen. There was a certain barrier of constraint springing up betweenhim and Doreen which had risen to an uncomfortable height by the timethe curate entered. 

Doreen, whose cheeks were much flushed and whose eyes were unusuallybright, was extremely gracious. She offered to take Mr. Lindsay into thegrounds to interview the gardener, so that they might come to anunderstanding about the evergreens to be used. She glanced at Dudley asshe made this proposal. He glanced back at her; and in his black eyesshe fancied for a moment that she saw a mute protest, a plea. 

For a moment she hesitated. Standing still in the middle of the room, not far from where he was busy helping Queenie to tie up a particularlylimp and fragile box of chocolates, she seemed to wait for a singleword, or even for another look, to turn her from her purpose. 

But Dudley turned away, and either did not see or did not choose tonotice the pause. Then the tears sprang to the girl's eyes, and she ranquickly to the door. 

"Come, Mr. Lindsay, " said she, "we must make haste. At this stage ofthings, every minute has to be weighed out like gold, I assure you. "

She went quickly out into the large hall, and the curate followed withalacrity. Max and his mother were engaged in a wrangle over some soupand coal tickets which somebody had mislaid, and in the search for whichthe whole room, with its parcels and bundles, had to be overturned. 

Queenie, who was at work at the end of the room, near the window, uttered a short laugh. Dudley, who was standing a little way off, drewnearer, and asked what she was laughing at. 

"Oh, that misguided youth who has just gone out!"

"Misguided?"

"Yes, " said Queenie, shortly. "If he hadn't been misguided, he wouldhave devoted his attention to me, not to Doreen. By all the laws ofsociety, curates' wives should be plain. They should also be simple intheir dress, and devoted to good works. Doreen says so herself. Why, then, didn't he see that I was the wife for him and not the beauty?"

"Don't you think she will have him, then?" asked Dudley, very stiffly, after a short pause. "She seems to like him. There was no need, surely, for her to have been in such a hurry to take him into the grounds, ifshe had felt no particular pleasure in his society. "

Queenie looked up rather slyly out of her little light eyes. She wasdistressed on account of her sister's trouble about this apparentlyvacillating lover, and irritated herself by his strange conduct. But atthe bottom of her heart she believed in him and in his affection forDoreen, just as her sister herself did, and she would have given theworld to make things right between two people whom she chose to believeintended by nature for each other. 

"I think there are other people in the world whose society Doreen likesbetter, " she said at last, below her breath. 

The wrangle at the other end of the room was still going on, and nobodyheard her but Dudley. He flushed slightly and looked as if heunderstood. But he instantly turned the talk to another subject. 

"Would you have liked that sleek curate yourself, really?"

"Sleek? What do you mean by sleek? You wouldn't have a minister of thechurch go about with long hair and a velveteen coat and a pipe in hismouth, would you?"

"Not for worlds, I assure you. He is a most beautiful creature, and Iadmire him very much, though he is perhaps hardly the sort of man Ishould have expected both you girls to rave about. And as for you, Ithought you were too good to rave about anybody! You are unlike yourselfthis morning, and more like Doreen. "

Queenie laughed again that satirical little laugh which made a manwonder what her thoughts exactly were. 

"You say that because you don't know anything about me. I don't talkwhen Doreen is talking, because then nobody would listen to me. I couldtalk, too, if anybody ever talked to me. "

"But one sees so little of you, " pleaded Dudley. "You are generally outdistrict-visiting, or busy for Mrs. Wedmore, so that one hasn't a chanceof knowing you well. And one has got an idea that you are too good towaste your time in idle conversation with a mere man!"

"Good!" cried Queenie contemptuously. "There's nothing good about mydistrict-visiting. I like it, Doreen goes about telling people it isgood of me. But that's only because she wouldn't care about it herself. I like fussing about and thinking I am making myself useful. It's likemamma's knitting, which gets her the reputation of being veryindustrious, while all the time she enjoys it very much. "

"But you yourself said you were 'devoted to good works, ' I quote yourvery words. "

"That was only in fun. It's what Doreen says of me. You must have heardher. She is much better than I am--really much, more unselfish--muchmore amiable. Only because she's always bright and full of fun, shedoesn't get the credit of any of her good qualities. People think she'sonly indulging her own inclination when she keeps us all amused andhappy all day long. But they don't know that she can suffer just as muchas anybody else, and that it costs her an effort to be lively for oursakes when she feels miserable. "

Queenie spoke with a little feeling in her usually hard, dry voice. Dudley was silent for a long time when she had finished speaking. Atlast they looked up at the same moment and met each other's eyes. Andthe reserved, harassed man felt his heart go out to the girl, with herquiet shrewdness and undemonstrative affection for her brilliant sister. 

"Your quiet eyes see a great deal more than one would think, Queenie, "he said at last. "I suppose they have seen that there issomething--something wrong--with--"

He spoke very slowly, and finally he stopped without finishing thesentence. 

Queenie gravely took it up for him. 

"Something wrong with you? Of course I have. Well?"

"I don't know why I am telling you this. I didn't mean to tell any one. But--but--well, I've begun; I may as well finish. You're not a personwho would talk about anybody else's secrets more than about your own. "

"A secret? Are you going to tell me a secret?"

Dudley smiled very faintly, and then his expression suddenly changed. Something like a spasm of fear and of pain shot quickly across his face, frightening her a little. Then he shook his head. 

"No, " said he. "I hardly think you will consider it a secret, after whatyou have just told me. I am only going to tell you this: I have had agreat trouble, a great affliction, hanging over me for some time now. Sometimes I have thought it was going to clear away and leave me as Iwas before. Sometimes I have felt myself quite free from it, and able togo on in the old way. But with this consciousness, this knowledgehanging over me always, I have behaved in all sorts of strange ways, have hurt the feelings of my friends, have not been myself at all. Youknow that, Queenie. "

Queenie slowly bowed her head. Mrs. Wedmore and Max, still occupied intheir search for the missing soup tickets, had now extended theiroperations to the hall, and left the room in possession of the othertwo. Dudley went on with his confession. 

"And now something has happened which has cut me off from my old self, as it were. I don't know how else to express what I mean. I came downlast night with the intention of speaking to--to Doreen for the lasttime, of trying to explain myself, if not to--to justify myself to her. You know what I mean, don't you?"

Again Queenie bowed her head. Her father's suspicions as to Dudley'sperfect sanity had, of course, reached her ears, and she felt so muchpity for the poor fellow whose confession she was then hearing that shedared not even raise her eyes to his face again. He went on, hurryinghis words, as if anxious to get his confession over:

"But I thought it all over last night, and I decided to say nothing toher, after all. I don't think I could, without making a fool of myself. For you know--you know my feelings about her; everybody knows. I hadhoped--Oh, well, you know what I hoped--"

There was a pause. Dudley was afraid of breaking down. 

"Oh, Dudley, is it really all over, then, between you? Oh, it isdreadful! For, you know, she cares, too!"

"Not as I do. I hope and think that is impossible, " said Dudley, hoarsely. 

There was another pause, a longer one. Then Queenie gave utterance to alittle sob. Dudley, who was sitting on the table at which she was atwork, got upon his feet with an impatient movement. His dark face lookedhard and angry. As he paced once or twice up and down the small spaceavailable in the disordered room, the inward fight which was going onbetween his passion and his sense of right convulsed his face, andQueenie shuddered as, glancing at him, she fancied she could see in theglare of his black eyes the haunting madness at which he seemed soplainly to have hinted. 

She rose in her turn. 

"But, Dudley--" she began. 

And then, unable to express what she felt, what she thought, any betterthan he had done, she turned abruptly away and sat down again. 

There was silence for a few moments, and then she heard the door close. Looking round, she saw that he had left the room. 

CHAPTER VI. 

THE LITTLE STONE PASSAGE. 

Queenie kept Dudley's half-confessed secret to herself for the whole ofthat day. She was hoping against hope that he would change his mindagain and speak to Doreen himself. Since there must be a definite andfinal breach, she thought it would be better for the principalsthemselves to come to an understanding, without the intervention ofoutsiders. She would have told him so, but she got no furtheropportunity of speaking to him alone. 

The day passed uncomfortably for everybody, although the only person whogave vent to his feelings by open ill-temper was Mr. Wedmore, who waswaiting for the promised explanation which Dudley never attempted togive. And before dinner-time that evening the young barrister returnedto town. 

Mr. Wedmore, who had been out shooting with Doctor Haselden, wasfurious, on returning home, to learn of Dudley's departure. 

"He has left a note for you, papa, in the study, " said Doreen, who was, perhaps, a little paler than usual, but who gave no other outward signof her feelings. 

Her father went into the study, after a glance at his daughter, and readthe letter. It was not a very long one. Following the lines of hisguarded confession to Queenie, Dudley expressed the sorrow he felt athaving to give up the hopes he had had of being something more than themere old friend he had been for so many years. He had thought it better, at the last, to say this on paper instead of by word of mouth, and heended by expressing the deep gratitude he should always feel for thekindness shown to him by Mr. Wedmore and all his family during thehappiest period of his life. 

Mr. Wedmore read this letter with little astonishment. It was, in fact, what he had been prepared to hear. He read it to his wife, who cried agreat deal, but acquiesced in her husband's desire that Dudley shoulddrop not only out of the ranks of their intimate friends, but even, asmuch as possible, out of their conversation. 

"Let us do our best, " said he, "to make Doreen forget him. "

Mr. Wedmore showed the letter also to Doctor Haselden, who, perhaps, from pure love of contradiction, persisted in maintaining that theletter confessed nothing, and that the cause of the young man'swithdrawal was, in all probability, quite different from what Mr. Wedmore supposed. The two gentlemen had quite a wrangle over the matter, at the end of which each was settled more firmly in his own opinion thanbefore. 

When they went upstairs for the night, Doreen came to Queenie's room anddemanded to know what her younger sister and Dudley had been talkingabout so earnestly in the breakfast-room that morning. 

"What do you mean by talking earnestly?" said Queenie, in the calm, drymanner which would have made any one but her sister think she was reallysurprised. 

"Max told me, " said Doreen, "and I mean to stay here until I know. "

It needed very little reflection to tell Queenie that it was better forher sister to hear the truth at once. So she told her. 

Doreen listened very quietly, and then got up and wished her sister goodnight. 

"Well, " said Queenie, "you take it very quietly. What do you think aboutit?"

"I'll tell you--when I know myself, " answered Doreen, briefly, as sheleft the room. The first result of the talks, however, was aconversation, not with Queenie, but with her brother, Max. Doreen ranafter him next morning as he was on his way to the stables and made himtake a walk through the park with her instead of going for a ride. 

"Max, " she said, coaxingly, when they had gone out of sight of thehouse, "you have been my confidant about this unhappy affair ofDudley's--"

But her brother interrupted her, and tried to draw away the arm she hadtaken. 

"Look here, Doreen, " said he earnestly, "you'd better not think any moreabout him--much better not. I do really think the poor fellow's right inwhat he hinted to my father, and that he's going off his head; or, rather, I _know_ enough to be sure that he's not always perfectlysane. Surely you must see that, in the circumstances, the less you thinkabout him the better. "

"There I disagree with you altogether, " said Doreen, firmly. "Max, papaand mamma can't understand; they've forgotten how they felt when theywere first fond of each other. Queenie's not old enough, and she's toogood besides. Now, you do know, you do understand what it is to be headover ears in love. "

"Good heavens, Doreen, don't talk like that! You mustn't, you know!"

"Don't talk nonsense, " interrupted his sister, sharply. "I tell you Ilove Dudley, and ever so much more since I've found out he is in greattrouble; as any decent woman would do. Now I don't feel nearly so sureas everybody else as to what his trouble is, but I want you to find out, and to help me if you can. "

"What, play detective--spy? Not me. It's ridiculous, unheard of. I'vedone it once on your account, and I never felt such a sneak in my life. I won't do it again, even for you, and that's flat. "

And Max thrust his hands deep into his pockets. 

"Won't you?" said Doreen, with a quiet smile. "Then I must, and I will. "

Her brother started and stared at her. 

"You! _You!_ What nonsense!"

"It's not nonsense, as you will find when you hear me get permission togo up to town to stay with Aunt Betty. "

Max grew sincerely alarmed. 

"Look here, Doreen, be reasonable, " said he. "You can do no good toDudley, believe me. He has got into some dreadful mess or other; butit's nothing that you or I or any earthly creature can help him out of. I confess I didn't tell you all I found out when I went up to town. Icouldn't. I can't now. But if you will persist, and if nothing else willkeep you quietly here, I--well, I promise to go up again. And I'llwarrant if I do I shall learn something which will convince even_you_ that you must give up every thought of him. "

"Will you promise, " said Doreen, solemnly, "to tell me all you findout?"

"No, " replied Max, promptly, "I won't promise that. I can't. But I thinkyou can trust me to tell you as much as you ought to know. "

With this promise Doreen was obliged to be content. And when, atluncheon time, it was discovered that certain things were wanted fromtown, and Max offered to go up for them, Doreen and her brotherexchanged a look from which she gathered that he would not forget hererrand. 

Max had plenty of time, while he was being jolted from Datton to CannonStreet, to decide on the best means of carrying out his promise. Hedecided that a visit to Limehouse, to the neighborhood where theproperty of the late Mr. Horne had been situated, would be better thananother visit to Dudley. 

Plumtree Wharf was, he knew, the name of the most important part of theproperty which had belonged to Dudley's father. Putting together the twofacts of the discovery of a ticket for Limehouse in Dudley's possession, and of the disappearance of Edward Jacobs after a visit to that localityon the same day, Max saw that there was something to be gleaned in thatneighborhood, if he should have the luck to light upon it. 

It was late in the afternoon, and already dark, before he got out of thetrain at Limehouse station, and began the exploration of the unsavorydistrict which fringes the docks. 

Through street after street of dingy, squalid houses he passed; somebroken up by dirty little shops, some presenting the dull uniformity ofrow after row of mean, stunted brick buildings, the broken windows ofmany of which were mended with brown paper, or else not mended at all. Here and there a grimy public house, each with its group of loafersabout the doors, made, with the lights in its windows, a spot ofcomparative brightness. 

Many of the streets were narrow and tortuous, roughly paved, and bothdifficult and dangerous to traverse by the unaccustomed foot passenger, who found himself now slipping on a piece of orange peel, the pale colorof which was disguised by mud, now risking the soundness of his anklesamong the uneven and slimy stones of the road. 

Max had to ask his way more than once before he reached the PlumtreeWharf, the entrance to which was through a door in a high wooden fence. Rather to his surprise, he found the door unfastened and unguarded. Andwhen he had got through he looked round and asked himself what on earthhe had expected to find there. 

There was nothing going on at this late hour, and Max was able to takestock of the place and of the outlook generally. Piles of timber to theright of him, the dead wall at the side of a warehouse on the left, gavehim but a narrow space in which to pursue his investigations. And theseonly amounted to the discovery that the troubled waters of the Thameslooked very dark and very cold from this spot; that the opposite bank, with little specks of light, offered a gloomy and depressing prospect, and that the lapping of the water among the black barges which weremoored at his feet in a dense mass was the dreariest sound he had everheard. He turned away with a shudder, and walked quickly up the narrowlane left by the timber, calling himself a fool for his journey. 

And just as he was reaching the narrow street by which he had come hewas startled to find a girl's face peering down at him from the top of apile of timber. 

Max stopped, with an exclamation. In an instant the girl withdrew thehead, which was all he had seen of her, and he heard her crawling backquickly over the timber, out of his sight. 

Although he had seen her for a moment only, Max had been chilled to thebone by the expression of the girl's face. Ghastly white it had lookedin the feeble light of a solitary gas lamp some distance away, andwearing an expression of fear and horror such as he had never seen onany countenance before. He felt that he must find out where she hadgone, his first belief being that she was a lunatic. Else why should shehave disappeared in that stealthy manner, with the look of fear stampedupon her face? There was nothing in the look or manner of Max himself toalarm her; and if she had been in need of help, why had she not calledto him?

He got a footing upon the timber and looked over it. But he could seenothing more of the girl. Beyond the stacks were some low-roofedoutbuildings and the back of a shut-up warehouse. Reluctantly he gotdown, and passed into the narrow street. Not willing to leave at once aneighborhood which he had come so far to investigate, he turned, aftergoing some dozen yards down the street, into a narrow passage on hisleft hand which led back to the river. 

The width between the high walls and the warehouses on either side wasonly some five feet. It was flagged with stone, very dark. About tenyards from the entrance there was a small warehouse, on the left hand, on which hung an old board, announcing that the building was "To Let. "And next door to this was a dingy shop, with grimy and broken windows, the door of which was boarded up. This shop, also, was "To Be Let, " andthe board in this case had been up so long that the announcement had tobe divined rather than read. 

Rather struck by the dilapidated appearance of these two buildings in aplace where he supposed land must be valuable, Max paused for aninstant. And as he did so, he became aware that there was some one byhis side. 

Looking down quickly, he saw the young girl of whom he had caught aglimpse a few minutes before. 

He started. 

She looked up at him, and, still with the same look of stereotypedhorror on her thin, white face, whispered, in a hoarse voice, as shepointed to the boarded-up shop-door with a shaking forefinger:

"You daren't go in there, do you? There's a dead man in there!"

CHAPTER VII. 

A QUESTIONABLE GUIDE. 

Max started violently at the girl's voice. 

"A dead man? In there? How do you know?"

In a hoarse voice the girl answered:

"How do I know? The best way possible. _I saw it done!_"

There was an awful silence. Max was so deeply impressed by the girl'swords, her looks, her manner, by the gloom of the cold, dark passage, bythe desolate appearance of the two deserted buildings before which theystood, that his first impulse was an overpowering desire to run away. Acting upon it he even took a couple of rapid steps in the direction ofthe street he had left, passing the girl and getting clear of theuncanny boarded-up front of the shop. 

A moan from the girl made him stop and look around at her. Emboldened bythis, she came close to him again and whispered:

"You're a man; you ought to have more pluck than I've got. It's two dayssince it happened--"

"Two days!" muttered Max, remembering that it was two days ago that hehad surprised Dudley with his blood-stained hands. 

"And for those two days I've been outside here waiting for somebody tocome because I daren't go inside by myself. Two days! Two days!" sherepeated, her teeth chattering. 

Max looked at her with mixed feelings of doubt, pity and astonishment. It was too dark in the ill-lighted passage for him to see all thedetails of her appearance. She was young, quite young; so much wascertain. She looked white and pinched and miserably cold. Her dress wasrespectable, very plain, and bore marks of her climbing and crawlingover the timber on the wharf. 

"Won't you go in with me?" she asked again, more eagerly, moretremulously than before. "I can show you the road--round at the back. You will have a little climbing to do, but you won't mind that. "

"But what do you want me to do if I do get inside?" said Max. "It's thepolice you ought to send for, if a man has died in there. Go to thepolice station and give information. "

The girl shook her head. 

"I can't do that, " she whispered. Then, after a shuddering pause, shecame a step nearer and said, in a lower whisper than ever: "He didn'tdie--of his own accord. He was murdered. "

Max grew hot, and cold. He heartily wished he had never come. 

"All the more reason, " he went on in a blustering voice, "why you shouldinform the police. You had better lose no time about it. "

"I can't do that, " said the girl, "because he--the man who did it--waskind to us--kind to Granny and me. If I tell the police, they will goafter him, and perhaps find him, and--and hang him. Oh, no, " and sheshook her head again with decision, "I could not do that. "

Max was silent for a few moments, looking at her for the first fewseconds with pity and then with suspicion. 

"Why do you tell all this to me, then--a stranger--if you're so afraidof the police finding out anything about it?"

The girl did not answer for a moment. She seemed puzzled to answer thequestion. At last she said:

"I didn't mean to. When I saw you first, at the wharf, at the backthere, I just looked at you and hid myself again. And then I thought tomyself that as you were a gentleman perhaps I might dare to ask you whatI did. "

Max, not unnaturally, grew more doubtful still. This apparently desertedbuilding, which he was asked to enter by the back way, might be athievish den of the worst possible character, and this girl, innocent asshe certainly looked, might be a thieves' decoy. Something in his faceor in his manner must have betrayed his thoughts to the shrewd Londoner;for she suddenly drew back, uttering a little cry of horror. Withoutanother word she turned and slunk back along the passage and into thestreet. 

Now, if Max had been a little older, or a little more prudent, if he hadindeed been anything but a reckless young rascal with a taste forexciting adventure, he would have taken this opportunity of getting awayfrom such a very questionable neighborhood. But, in the first place, hewas struck by the girl's story, which seemed to fit in only too wellwith what he knew; and in the second place, he was interested in thegirl herself, the refinement of whose face and manner, in these dubioussurroundings, had impressed him as much as the expression of horror onher face and the agony of cold which had caused her teeth to chatter andher limbs to tremble. 

Surely, he thought, the suspicions he had for a moment entertained abouther were incorrect. He began to feel that he could not go away withoutmaking an effort to ascertain if there were any truth in her story. 

He went along the passage and got back to the wharf by the same means asbefore. Making his way round the pile of timber upon which he had firstseen the girl, he discovered a little lane, partly between and partlyover the planks, which he promptly followed in the hope of coming insight of her again. 

And, crouching under the wall of a ruinous outhouse, in an attitudeexpressive of the dejection of utter abandonment, was the white-facedgirl. 

The discovery was enough for Max. All considerations of prudence, ofcaution, crumbled away under the influence of the intense pity he feltfor the forlorn creature. 

"Look here, " said he, "I'll go in, if you like. Have you got a light?"

"No--o, " answered the girl, in a voice which was thick with sobs. "But Ican show you where to get one when you get inside. "

Max had by this time reached the ground, which was slimy and damp underthe eaves; and he pushed his way, with an air of recklessness which hidsome natural trepidation, into the outhouse, the door of which was noteven fastened. 

"Why, " said he, turning to the girl, who was close behind him, "youcould have got in yourself easily enough. At least you would have beenwarmer in here than outside. "

His suspicions were starting up again, and they grew stronger as heperceived that she was paying little attention to him, that she seemedto be listening for some expected sound. The place in which they nowstood was quite dark, and Max, impatient and somewhat alarmed by theposition in which he found himself, struck a match and looked round him. 

"Now, " said he, "find me a candle, if you can. "

Even by the feeble light of the match he could see that he was in a sortof a scullery, which bore traces of recent occupation. A bit of yellowsoap, some blacking and a couple of brooms in one corner, a pail and awooden chair in another, were evidently not "tenant's fixtures. "

And then Max noted a strange circumstance--the two small windows wereboarded up on the inside. 

By the time he had taken note of this, the girl had brought him a candlein a tin candlestick, which she had taken from a shelf by the door. 

"That's the way, " she said, in a voice as low a before, pointing to aninner door. "Through the back room, and into the front one. He lies inthere. "

Max shuddered. 

"I can't say that I particularly want to see him, " said he, as he tookstock of her in the candle-light, and was struck by the peculiar beautyof her large blue eyes. 

He felt a strong reluctance to venturing farther into this veryquestionable and mysterious dwelling; and he took care to stand where hecould see both doors, the one which led farther into the house and theone by which he had entered. 

The girl heaved a little sigh, of relief apparently. And she remainedstanding before him in the same attitude of listening expectancy as hehad remarked in her already. 

"What are you waiting for--listening for?" asked Max sharply. 

"Nothing, " she answered with a start. "I'm nervous, that's all. Wouldn'tyou be, if you'd been waiting two days outside an empty house with adead man inside it?"

Her tone was sharp and querulous. Max looked at her in bewilderment. 

"Empty house!" he repeated. "What were you doing in it, then?"

And he glanced round him, assuring himself afresh by this secondscrutiny of the fact that the brick floor and the bare walls of thisscullery had been kept scrupulously clean. 

The girl's white face, pale with the curious opaque pallor of theLondoner born and bred, flushed a very little. She dropped her eyelidsguiltily. 

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you, " she said, at last, rathersulkily. "I was living here. Is that enough?"

It was not. And her visitor's looks told her so. 

"I was living here with my grandmother, " she went on hurriedly, as shesaw Max glance at the outer door and take a step toward it. "We're verypoor, and it's cheaper to live here in a house supposed to be empty thanto pay rent. "

"But hardly fair to the landlord, " suggested Max. 

"Oh, Granny doesn't think much of landlords, and, besides, this is partof the property which used to belong to her old master, Mr. Horne--"

"Ah!" ejaculated Max, with new interest. 

The girl looked at him inquiringly. 

"What do you know about him?" she asked, with eagerness. 

"I have heard of him, " said Max. 

But the astute young Londoner was not to be put off so easily. 

"You know something of the whole family, perhaps? Did you know the oldgentleman himself?"

"No. "

"Do you know--his son?"

"Yes. "

"Oh!" She assumed the attitude of an inquisitor immediately. "Perhaps itwas he who sent you here to-day?"

"No. "

She looked long and scrutinizingly in his face, suspicious in her turn. "Then what made you come?"

Max paused a moment, and then evaded her question very neatly. 

"What made me come in here? Why, I came by the invitation of a younglady, who told me she was afraid to go in alone. "

The girl drew back a little. 

"Yes, so I did. And I am very much obliged to you. I--I wanted to askyou to go into that room, the front room, and to fetch some things ofmine--things I have left there. I daren't go in by myself. "

Max hesitated. Beside his old suspicions, a new one had just startedinto his mind. 

"Did you, " he asked, suddenly, "know of some letters which were writtento Mr. Dudley Horne?"

A change came over the girl's face; the expression of deadly terrorwhich he had first seen upon it seemed to be returning gradually. Theblue eyes seemed to grow wider, the lines in her cheek and mouth tobecome deeper. After a short pause, during which he noticed that herbreath was coming in labored gasps, she whispered:

"Well, what if I do? Mind, I don't say that I do. But what if I do?"

Her manner had grown fiercely defiant by the time she came to the lastword. Max found the desire to escape becoming even stronger than hiscuriosity. The half-guilty look with which his companion had made herlast admission caused a new light to flash into his mind. This "Granny"of whom the girl spoke, and who was alleged to have disappeared, was awoman who had known something of the Horne family. Either she or thisgirl might have been the writer of the letter Dudley had received whileat The Beeches, which had summoned him so hastily back to town. What ifthis old woman had accomplices--had attempted to rob Dudley? And what ifDudley, in resisting their attempts, had, in self-defence, struck a blowwhich had caused the death of one of his assailants? Dudley wouldnaturally have been silent on the subject of his visit to thisquestionable haunt, especially to the brother of Doreen. 

"I think, " cried Max, as he strode quickly to the door by which he hadcome in, "that the best thing you can do is to sacrifice your things, whatever they are, and to get out of the place yourself as fast as youcan. "

As he spoke he lifted the latch and tried to open the door. But althoughthe latch went up, the door remained shut. 

Max pulled and shook it, and finally put his knee against the side-postand gave the handle of the latch a terrific tug. 

It broke in his hand, but the door remained closed. 

He turned round quickly, and saw the girl, with one hand on her hip andwith the candle held in the other, leaning against the whitewashed wall, with a smile of amusement on her thin face. 

What a face it was! Expressive as no other face he had ever seen, andwearing now a look of what seemed to Max diabolical intelligence andmalice. She nodded at him mockingly. 

"I can't get out!" thundered he, threateningly, with another thump atthe door. 

The girl answered in the low voice she always used; by contrast with hismenacing tones it seemed lower than ever:

"I don't mean you to--yet. I guessed you'd want to go pretty soon, so Ilocked the door. "

CHAPTER VIII. 

FOREWARNED, BUT NOT FOREARMED. 

"By Jove!" muttered Max. Then, with a sudden outburst of energy, inspired by indignation at the trap in which he found himself, he dashedacross the floor to the zinc pail he had previously noticed, andswinging it round his head, was about to make such an attack upon thedoor as its old timbers could scarcely have resisted, when the girlsuddenly shot between him and the door, placing herself with her back toit and her arms spread out, so quickly that he only missed by a hair'sbreadth dealing her such a blow as would undoubtedly have split herskull. 

In the effort to avoid this, Max, checking himself, staggered andslipped, falling on the brick floor, pail and all. 

"Oh, I am sorry! So sorry!"

Again the oddly expressive face had changed completely. Her scarletlips--those vividly red lips which go with an opaque white skin--wereinstantly parted with genuine terror. Her eyes looked soft and shining, full of tender feminine kindness and sympathy. Down she went on herknees beside him, asking anxiously:

"Are you hurt? Oh, I know your wrist is hurt!"

Max gave her a glance, the result of which was that he began to feelmore afraid of her than of the locked door. About this strange, almostuncannily beautiful child of the riverside slum there was a fascinationwhich appealed to him more and more. The longer he looked at the wide, light-blue eyes, listened to the hoarse but moving voice, the morevaliantly he had to struggle against the spell which he felt her to becasting upon him. 

"I've strained my wrist a little, I think. Nothing to matter, " said he. 

But as he moved he found that the wrist gave him pain. He got up fromthe floor, and stood with his left hand clasping the injured rightwrist, not so eager as before to make his escape. 

"Why don't you let me out?" he asked at last, sharply, with an effort. 

The girl looked at him with yet a new expression on her mobile face--anexpression of desperation. 

"Because I couldn't bear it any longer, " she whispered. And as she spokeher eyes wandered round the bare walls and rested for a moment on theinner door. "Because when you've been all alone in the cold, without anyfood, without any one to speak to for two days and two nights, you feelyou must speak to some one, whatever comes of it. If I'd had to wait outthere, listening, listening, for another night, I should have been mad, raving mad in the morning. "

"But I don't understand it at all, " said Max, again inclining to beliefin the girl's story, impressed by her passionate earnestness. "Where hasyour grandmother gone to? Why didn't she take you with her? Can't youtell me the whole story?"

The girl looked at him curiously. 

"Just now you only thought of getting away. "

"I don't care to be detained by lock and key, certainly, " said Max. "Butif you will unlock the door, I am quite ready to wait here until youhave unburdened your mind, if you want to do that. "

She looked at him doubtfully. 

"That's a promise, mind, " said she at last. "And it's a promise youwouldn't mind giving, I think, if you believed in half I've gonethrough. "

She took a key from her pocket, unlocked the outer door and set it ajar. 

"Will that do for you?" asked she. 

"Yes, that's all right. "

She took up the candle, which she had put on a shelf while she knelt tofind out whether he was hurt, and crossing the brick floor with rapid, rather stealthy steps, she put her fingers on the latch of the innerdoor. 

"Keep close!" whispered she. 

Max obeyed. He kept so close that the girl's soft hair, which was of theash-fair color so common in English blondes who have been flaxen-headedin their childhood, almost touched his face. She opened the door andentered what was evidently the back room of the deserted shop. 

A dark room it must have been, even in broadest daylight. Opposite tothe door by which they had entered was one which was glazed in the upperhalf; this evidently led into the shop itself, although the old redcurtain which hung over the glass panes hid the view of what was beyond. There was a little fireplace, in which were the burnt-out ashes of arecent fire. There was a deal table in the middle of the room, and acloth of a common pattern of blue and red check lay in a heap on thefloor. A couple of plain Windsor chairs, and a third with arms and acushion, a hearth-rug, a fender and fire-irons, completed the furnitureof the room. 

And the one window, a small one, which looked out upon the wharf, in acorner formed by the outhouse on the one side and a shed on the other, was carefully boarded up. 

Grimly desolate the dark, bare room looked, small as it was; and acouple of rats, which scurried over the floor as Max entered, added asuggestion of other horrors to the deserted room. The girl had managedto get behind Max, and he turned sharply with a suspicion that she meantto shut him into the room by himself. 

"It's all right--it's all right, " whispered she, reassuringly. "He isn'tin here. But he's there. "

And she pointed to the door with the red curtain. 

Max stopped. The farther he advanced into this mysterious house the lesshe liked the prospect presented to his view. And the girl herself seemedto have forgotten her pretext of wanting something fetched out of thatmysterious third room. She remained leaning against the wall, close bythe door by which she and Max had entered, still holding the candlestickand staring at the red curtain with eyes full of terror. Max found hisown eyes fascinated by the steady gaze, and he looked in the samedirection. 

Staring intently at the bit of faded stuff, he was almost ready toimagine, in the silence and gloom of the place, that he saw it move. Hisbreath came fast. Overcome by the uncanny influences of the dreary placeitself, of the hideous story he had heard, of the girl's white face, Maxbegan to feel as if the close, cold air of the unused room was like thetouch of clammy fingers on his face. 

Even as this consciousness seized upon him, he heard a moan, a slidingsound, a thud, and the light went suddenly out. 

In the first impulse of horror at his position Max uttered a sharpexclamation, but remained immovable. Indeed, in the darkness, in thisunknown place, to take a step in any direction was impossible. He stoodlistening, waiting for some sound, some ray of light, to guide him. 

All he heard was the scurrying of the rats as they ran, disturbed by thenoise, across the room and behind the wainscot in the darkness. 

At last he turned and tried to find the door by which he had come in. Hefound it, and had his hand upon the latch, when his right foot touchedsomething soft, yielding. He opened the door, which was not locked, ashe had feared, and was about to make his way as fast as he could intothe open air, when another moan, fainter than before, reached his ears. 

No light came into the room through the open door; so he struck a waxmatch. His nerves were not at their best, and it was some time before hecould get a light. When he did so, he discovered that the thing his foothad touched was the body of the girl, lying in a heap on the floor closeto the wainscot. 

Now Max was divided between his doubts and his pity; but it was notpossible that doubt should carry the day in the face of this discovery. Whether she had fainted, or whether this was only a ruse on her part todetain him, to interest him, he could not leave her lying there. 

The tin candlestick had rolled away on the floor, and the candle hadfallen out of it. The first thing Max had to do was to replace the onein the other, and to get a serviceable light. By the time he had done sohe saw a movement in the girl's body. She was lying with her head on thefloor. He put his arm under her head to raise it, when she started up, so suddenly as to alarm him, leaned back against the wall, still in hercramped, sitting position, and glared into his face. 

"Look here, " she said faintly, "I couldn't help it. You know--Ithink--I'm almost--starving. "

"Heavens! Why didn't I think of it! Poor child! Get up; let me help you. Come to this chair. Wait here, only a few minutes. I'll get yousomething to eat and drink. "

He was helping her up; had got her on her feet, indeed, when shesuddenly swung round in his arms, clinging to his sleeve and staringagain with the fixed, almost vacant look which made him begin to doubtwhether her reason had not suffered. 

"No, no, no, " cried she, gasping for breath; "I can't stay here. I know, I know you wouldn't come back. If you once got out, got outside in theair, you would go back to your home, and I should be lefthere--alone--with the rats--and--_that_!"

And again she pointed to the curtained door. 

Max felt his teeth chattering as he tried to reassure her. 

"Come, won't you trust me? I'll only be a minute. I want to get you somebrandy. "

"Brandy? No. I dare not. "

And she shook her head. But Max persisted. 

"Nonsense--you must have it. There's a public-house at the corner, ofcourse. Come out on to the wharf, if you like and wait for me. "

It was pitiful to see the expression of her eyes as she looked in hisface without a word. She was leaning back in the wooden arm-chair, onehand lying in her lap, the other hanging limply over the side of thechair. Her hair, which had been fastened in a coil at the back of herhead, had been loosened in the fall, and now drooped about her head andface in disorder, which increased her pathetic beauty. And it was atthis point that Max noticed, with astonishment, that her hands, thoughnot specially beautiful or small or in any way remarkable, were notthose of a woman used to the roughest work. 

She made an attempt to rise, apparently doubting his good faith andafraid to lose sight of him, as he retreated toward the door. But shefell back again, and only stared at him dumbly. 

The mute appeal touched Max to the quick. He was always rathersusceptible, but it seemed to him that he had never felt, at the handsof any girl, such a variety of emotions as this forlorn creature rousedin him with every movement, every look, every word. 

He hesitated, came back a step and leaned over the table, looking ather. 

"I'll come back, " said he, in a voice hardly above a whisper. "Of courseI'll come back. You don't think I'd leave you like this, do you?"

For a moment she stared at him with doubt in her eyes; then, as ifreassured, her lips parted in a very faint smile, and she made a slightmotion with her head which he was fain to take as a sign of her trust. 

He had reached the door, when by a weak gesture she called him backagain. 

"If--if you should meet anybody--I'm expecting Granny all the time--I'msure she wouldn't leave me altogether like this--you will come back allthe same, won't you?"

Her earnestness over this matter had given her back a little strength. She leaned forward over one arm of the chair, impressing her words uponhim with a bend of the head. 

"Oh, no, I shan't mind Granny, " replied Max, confidently. 

"Well, you wouldn't mind her if she was in a good humor, " went on thegirl, doubtfully, "but when she's in a bad one, oh, well, then, " in alowered voice of deep confidence, "_I'm afraid of her myself!_"

"That's all right. It would take more than an old woman to frighten me!Tell me what she's like and what her name is, and I can present myselfto her as a morning caller. "

The girl seemed to have recovered altogether from her attack offaintness, since she was able to detain him thus from his proposederrand on her behalf. She smiled again, less faintly than before, andshook her head. 

"I don't think there's much to describe about Granny. She was ahousekeeper at old Mr. Horne's house in the city, you know, and shelooks just as old housekeepers always look. Her name's Mrs. Higgs. But, "and the girl looked frightened again, "don't tell her you've come to see_me_. She's very particular. At least--I mean--"

A pretty confusion, a touch of hesitancy, the first sign of anythinggirlish which Max had seen in this strange creature, made her stop andturn her head away. And, the effort of speaking over, she drooped again. 

"I won't be long. "

And Max, puzzled himself by the feelings he had toward this strangelittle white-bodied being, went through the outhouse into the open air. 

Outside, he found himself staggering, he didn't know why--whether fromthe emotions he had experienced or from the clammy, close hair of theshut-up room; all he knew was that by the time he reached thepublic-house, which he had correctly foreseen was to be found at thecorner, he felt quite as much in want of the brandy as his patientherself. 

It occurred to him, as he stood in the bar, swallowing some fiery liquidof dubious origin which the landlord had sold to him as brandy, to makea casual inquiry about Mrs. Higgs. 

"Yes, " said the landlord, "I do know a Mrs. Higgs. She comes in heresometimes; she likes her glass. But they know more about her at TheAdmiral's Arms, Commercial Road way, " and he gave a nod of the head toindicate the direction of that neighborhood. 

"Do you know her address?" asked Max. 

The landlord smiled. 

"It 'ud take a clever head to keep the addresses of all the chancecustomers as comes in here. For the matter of that, very few of 'em haveany addresses in particular; it's one court one week, and t'other thenext. "

"But she's a very respectable woman, the Mrs. Higgs I mean, " said Max, tentatively. 

"Oh, yes, sir; I've nothin' to say ag'inst her, " and the landlord, witha look which showed that he objected to be "pumped, " turned to anothercustomer. 

Max took the brandy he had bought for the girl and hurried back to theplace where he had left her. As he went, an instinct of curiosity, natural enough, considering his recently acquired knowledge, made him godown the passage and try to look in through the grim, dusty window ofthe shop. But this also was boarded up on the inner side, so that noview could be obtained of what was within. 

It seemed to Max, however, as he stood there, with his eyes fixed on theplanks, trying to discover an aperture, that between the cracks of theboards there glimmered a faint light. It seemed to flicker, then it diedout. 

Surely, he thought, the girl has not summoned enough courage to go intothe room by herself?

He hurried back down the passage, and made his way as before to thewharf. Stumbling round the piles of timber, he found the lane by whichhe had entered and left the house. It seemed to him, though he toldhimself it must be only fancy, that some of the loose planks had beendisturbed since his last journey over them. Reaching the door ofouthouse, which he had left ajar, he found it shut. 

He was now sure that some one had gone in, or come out, since he left;and for a moment the circumstance seemed to him sufficiently suspiciousto make him pause. The next moment, however, the remembrance of thegirl's white face, of the pleading blue eyes, returned to him vividly, calling to him, drawing him back by an irresistible spell. He pushedopen the door boldly, crossed the brick floor and reentered the innerroom. The candle was still burning on the table, but the girl was notthere. 

Max looked round the room. He was puzzled, suspicious. As he stood bythe table staring at the wall opposite the fireplace, wondering whetherto go out or to explore further, he found his eyes attracted to a spotin the wall-paper where, in the feeble light, something like twoglittering beads shone out uncannily in the middle of the pattern. Witha curious sensation down his spine, Max took a hasty step back to thedoor, and the beads moved slowly. 

It was a pair of eyes watching him as he moved. 

CHAPTER IX. 

THE MAN WHO HESITATES. 

Max had become accustomed, in the course of this adventurous visit, tosurprises and alarms. Every step in the enterprise he had undertaken hadbrought a fresh excitement, a fresh horror. But nothing that he had sofar heard or seen had given him such a sick feeling of indefinableterror as the sight of these two eyes, turning to watch his everymovement. For a moment he watched them, then he made a bold dash for theplace where he had seen them, and aimed a blow with his fist at thewall. 

He heard the loose plaster rattle down; but when he looked for theresult of his blow, he saw nothing but the old-fashioned, dirty paper onthe wall, apparently without a hole or tear in it. 

The discovery made him feel sick. 

He turned to make his escape from the house, to which he felt that hewas a fool to have returned at all, when the door by which he hadentered opened slowly, and the girl came in. 

A little flash, as of pleased surprise, passed over her white face. Thenshe said, under her breath:

"So you have come back. I didn't think you would. I--I am sorry youdid. "

Max looked rather blank. The girl's attraction for him had increasedduring the short period he had been absent from her. He had had time tothink over his feelings, to find his interest stimulated by the process. Imagination, which does so much for a woman with a man, and for a manwith a woman, had begun to have play. He had come back determined tofind out more about the girl, to probe to the bottom of the mystery inwhich, perhaps, consisted so much of the charm she had for him. 

Even now, upon her entrance, the first sight of her face had made hisheart leap up. 

There was a pause when she finished speaking. Max, who was usuallyfluent enough with her sex, hesitated, stammered and at last said:

"You are sorry I came back? Yet you seemed anxious enough to make mepromise to come back!"

He observed that a great change had come over her. Instead of beingnerveless and lifeless, as he had left her, with dull eyes and weak, helpless limbs, she was now agitated, excited; she glanced nervouslyabout her while he spoke, and tapped the finger-tips of one handrestlessly with those of the other as she listened. 

"I know, " she replied, rapidly, "I know I was. But--Granny has comeback. She came in while you were gone. "

Max glanced at the wall, where he had fancied he saw the pair ofwatching eyes. 

"Oh, " said he, "that explains what I saw, perhaps. Where is yourgrandmother?"

"She has gone upstairs to her room under the roof. "

"Ah! Are you sure she is upstairs? That she is not in the next room, forinstance, watching me through some secret peep-hole of hers?"

The girl stared at him in silence as he pointed to the wall, and as heran his hand over its surface. 

"I saw a pair of eyes watching me just now, " he went on, "from themiddle of this wall. I could swear to it!"

The girl looked incredulous, and passed her hand over the wall in herturn. Then she shook her head. 

"I can feel nothing, " said she. "It must be your fancy. There is no roomthere. It is the ground-floor of an old warehouse next door which hasbeen to let for years and years--longer than this. "

He still looked doubtful, and she added, sharply:

"You can see for yourself if you like. "

As she spoke, she was turning to go back into the outhouse, with a signto him to follow her. But even as she did so, another thought must havestruck her, for she shut the door and turned back again. 

"No, " she said, decisively, "of course you don't want to see anything somuch as the outside of this gloomy old house. Don't think me ungrateful;I am not, but"--she came a little nearer to Max, so that she couldwhisper very close to his ear--"if Granny knew that I'd let a strangerinto the place while she was away, I should never hear the last of it;and--and--when she's angry I'm afraid of her. "

Max felt a pang of compassion for the girl. 

"If you are afraid of her being angry, " said he, "you had better let hersee me and hear my explanation. I can make things right with her. I havegreat powers of persuasion--with old ladies--I assure you; and you don'tlook as if you were equal to a strife of tongues with her or withanybody just now; and I'd forgotten; I've brought something for you. "

Max took from the pocket of his overcoat the little flat bottle filledwith brandy with which he had provided himself; but the girl pushed itaway with alarm. 

"Don't let Granny see it!" she whispered. 

"All right. But I want you to taste it; it will do you good. "

She shook her head astutely. 

"I am not ill, " she said, shortly, "and I don't know that I should takeit if I were. I see too much of those things not to be afraid of them. And, now, sir, will you go?" After a short pause she added, in anominous tone--"while you have the chance. "

Max still lingered. He had forgotten his curiosity, he had almostforgotten what had brought him to the house in the first instance. Hedid not want to leave this girl, with the great, light-blue eyes and thescarlet lips, the modest manner and the moving voice. 

When the silence which followed her words had lasted some seconds, sheturned from him impatiently, and leaving him by the door, crossed thelittle room quickly, opened one of the two wooden doors which stood oneon each side of the fireplace, revealing a cupboard with rows ofshelves, and took from the bottom a few chips of dry wood, evidentlygleaned from the wharf outside, a box of matches and part of anewspaper, and dropping down on her knees on the hearth, began brisklyto rake out the ashes and to prepare a fire. 

Max stood watching her, divided between prudence, which urged him to go, and inclination, which prompted him to stay. 

She went on with her work steadily for some minutes, without so much asa look behind. Yet Max felt that she was aware of his presence, and heknew also, without being sure how the knowledge came to him, that thegirl's feeling toward himself had changed now that she was no longeralone in the house with him. The constraint which might have beenexpected toward a person of the opposite sex in the strangecircumstances, which had been so entirely absent from her manner ontheir first meeting, had now stolen into her attitude toward him. 

Yet, although the former absence of this constraint had been a mosteffective part of her attraction for him, Max began to think that thenew and slight self-consciousness which caused her to affect to ignorehim was a fresh charm. Before, while she implored him to come into thehouse with her, it was to a fellow-creature only that the frightenedgirl had made her appeal. Now that her grandmother had returned, and shewas lonely and unprotected no longer, she remembered that he was a man. 

This change in her attitude toward him was strikingly exemplified when, having lit the fire, she rose from her knees, and taking a kettle fromthe hob, turned toward the door. 

"You haven't gone then?" said she. 

"No!"

She came forward, taking the lid off the kettle as she walked. 

"You won't be advised?"

She was passing him swiftly, with the manner of a busy housewife, whenMax, encouraged by her new reserve, and a demure side-look, which wasnot without coquetry, seized the hand which held the kettle, and askedher if he was to get no thanks for coming to her assistance as he haddone. 

"I did thank you, " said she, not attempting to withdrew her hand, butstanding, grave and with downcast eyes, between him and the door. 

"Well, in a way, you did. But you didn't thank me enough. You yourselfadmit it was a bold thing for a stranger to do!"

The girl looked suddenly up into his face, and again he saw in herexpressive eyes a look which was altogether new. Like flashes oflightning the changes passed over her small, mobile features, to whichthe absence of even a tinge of healthy pink color gave, perhaps, anadded power of portraying the emotions which might be agitating her. There was now something like defiance in her eyes. 

"What was your boldness compared to mine?" said she. "You are a man; youhave strong arms, at any rate, I suppose. I am only a girl, and you area gentleman, and gentlemen are not chivalrous. Who dared the most then, you or I?"

"So gentlemen are not chivalrous?" said Max, ignoring the last part ofher speech. "All gentlemen are not, I suppose you mean? Or rather, allthe men who ought to be gentlemen?"

"No, " answered the girl, stubbornly. "I mean what I said. You with therest. You'd act rightly toward a man, I suppose, as a matter of course. You can't act rightly toward a woman, a girl, without expecting to bepaid for it. "

Max was taken aback. Here was a change, indeed, from the poor, clinging, pleading, imploring creature of twenty minutes before. He reddened alittle and let her hand slip from his grasp. 

"I believe you are right, " he said, at last, "though you are rathersevere. But let me tell you that the word 'chivalry' is misleadingaltogether. It is applied to those middle-aged Johnnies--no, I meanthose Johnnies of the Middle Ages--who were supposed to go aboutrescuing damsels in distress, isn't it? Well, you don't know whathappened after the rescue was effected; but I like to suppose, myself, that the girl didn't just say 'Thanks--awfully' and cut him dead foreverafterward. "

"You think the knight expected payment, just as you do, for hisservices?"

"I think so. A very small payment, but one which he would appreciatehighly. "

The girl leaned against the wall by the door and looked at him withsomething like contempt for a moment. Then she smiled, notencouragingly, but with mockery in her eyes. 

"You have a tariff, I suppose, " said she, cuttingly, "a regular scale ofcharges, as, perhaps, you will say the knights had. Pray, what is yourcharge in the present instance? A kiss, perhaps, or two?"

Now, Max had, indeed, indulged the hope that she would bestow upon himthis small mark of gratitude. It came upon him with a shock of surprisethat a girl who had been so bold as to summon him should make so muchfuss about the reward he had certainly earned. He had expected to get itwith a laugh and a blush, as a matter of course. For his modestsuggestion to be taken so seriously was a disconcerting occurrence. Hedrew himself up a little. 

"I don't pretend I should have been generous enough to refuse such apayment if you had shown the slightest willingness to make it, " said he. "But as it's the sort of coin that has no value unless givenvoluntarily, we will consider the debt settled without it. "

He made a pretense of leaving her at this point, without the slightestintention of persisting in it. This curious conference had all the zestof a most novel kind of flirtation, which was none the less piquant forthe girl's haughty airs. 

There are feminine eyes which allure as much while they seem to repel asthey do when they consciously attract; and the light-blue ones whichshone in the white face of this East End enchantress were of the number. 

Max opened the door and slowly stepped into the outhouse. At the momentof glancing back--an inevitable thing--he saw that she looked sorry, dismayed. He took his gloves out of his pocket and began to draw themon, to fill up the time. By the time the second finger of the firstglove was in its place, for he was deliberate, the girl had come intothe outhouse, passed him, and was drawing water from the tap into herkettle. He watched her. She knew it, but pretended not to notice. Thecircumstance of the water flowing freely in the house which was supposedto be deserted made an excuse for another remark, and a safe one. 

"I thought they cut the water off from empty houses; that is, housessupposed to be empty. "

She turned round with so much alacrity as to suggest that she was gladof the pretext for reopening communications. And this time there was abright look of arch amusement on her face instead of her formerexpression of outraged dignity. 

"So they do. But--the people who know how to live without paying rentknow a few other things, too. "

Max laughed a little, but he was rather shocked. This pretty and in somerespects fastidiously correct young person ought not surely to findamusement in defrauding even a water company. 

The fact reminded him of that which the intoxication caused by a prettyface had made him forget--that he was in a house of dubious character, from which he would be wise in escaping without further delay. But then, again, it was the very oddness of the contrast between the character ofthe house and the behavior of the girl which made the piquancy of thesituation. 

"Oh, yes; of course; I'd forgotten that, " assented Max, limply. 

And then he fell into silence, and the girl stood quietly by the tap, which ran slowly, till the kettle was full. 

And then it began to run over. 

Now this incident was a provocation. Max was artful enough to know thatno girl who ever fills a kettle lets it run over unless she is muchpreoccupied. He chose to think she was preoccupied with him. So helaughed, and she looked quickly round and blushed, and turned her backupon him with ferocity. 

He came boldly up to her. 

"I'm so sorry, " said he, in a coaxing, confidential, persuasive tone, such as she had given him no proper encouragement to use, "that we'vehad a sort of quarrel just at the last, and spoiled the impression ofyou I wanted to carry away. "

He was evidently in no hurry to carry anything away, though he went onwith the glove-buttoning with much energy. 

She listened, with her eyes down, making, kettle and all, the prettiestpicture possible. There was no light in the outhouse except that whichcame from a little four-penny brass hand-lamp, which the girl must havelit just before her last entrance into the inner room. It was behindher, on a shelf against the wall; and the light shone through the loosethreads of her fair hair, making an aureole round the side view of herlittle head. 

She was bewitching like that, so the susceptible Max thought, while hedebated with himself whether he now dared to try again for that smallreward. And he reluctantly decided that he did not dare. And again therewas something piquant in the fact of his not daring. 

The girl, after a short pause, looked up; perhaps, though not sosusceptible as he, she was not insensible to the fact that Max was youngand handsome, well dressed, a little in love with her, and altogetherdifferent from the types of male humanity most common to Limehouse. 

"If, " she suggested at last, with some hesitation, "you really think itbetter to see my grandmother, she will be down very soon. I'm going tomake some tea; and you could wait, if you liked, in the next room. "

"I should be delighted, " said Max. 

Off came the gloves; and as the girl tripped quickly into the adjoiningroom, he followed with alacrity. 

"Mind, " cried she suddenly, as she turned from the fireplace and stoodby the table in an attitude of warning, "it is at your own risk, youknow, that you stay. You can guess that the people who belong to ahole-and-corner place like this are not the sort you're accustomed tomeet at West-End dinner tables, nor yet at an archbishop's garden-party. But as you've stayed so long, it will be better for me if you stay tillyou have seen Granny, as she must have heard me talking to you by thistime. "

Now Max, in the interest of his conversation with the girl, hadforgotten all about less pleasant subjects. Now that they were suddenlyrecalled to his mind, he felt uneasy at the idea of the unseen butever-watchful "Granny, " who might be listening to every word he uttered, noting every glance he threw at the girl. 

And then the natural suspicion flashed into his mind: Was there a"Granny" after all? or was the invisible one some person more to bedreaded than any old woman?

Another glance at the girl, and the fascinated, bewildered Max resolvedto risk everything for a little more of her society. 

CHAPTER X. 

GRANNY. 

There was some constraint upon them both at first; and Max had had timeto feel a momentary regret that he had been foolish enough to stay, whenhe was surprised to find the girl's eyes staring fixedly at a smallparcel which he had taken from his coat-tail pocket and placed upon thetable. 

It was a paper of biscuits which he had brought from the public-house. He had forgotten them till that moment. 

"I brought these for you--" he began. 

And then, before he could add more, he was shocked by the avidity withwhich she almost snatched them from his hand. 

"I--I'd forgotten!" stammered he. 

It was an awful sight. The girl was hungry, ravenously hungry, and hehad been chatting to her and talking about kisses when she was starving!

There was again a faint spot of color in her cheeks, as she turned herback to him and crouched on the hearth with the food. 

"Don't look at me, " she said, half laughing, half ashamed. "I supposeyou've never been without food for two days!"

Max could not at first answer. He sat in one of the wooden chairs, withhis elbows on his knees and his hands clasped, calling himself, mentally, all sorts of things for his idiotic forgetfulness. 

"And to think, " said he, at last, in a hoarse and not over-steady-voice, "that I dared to compare myself to a knight-errant!"

The biscuits were disappearing rapidly. Presently she turned and let himsee her face again. 

"Perhaps, " suggested she, still with her mouth full, "as you say, onedidn't hear quite all about those gentlemen. Perhaps they forgot thingssometimes. And perhaps, " she added, with a most gracious change togratitude and kindness, "they weren't half so sorry when they forgot asyou are. "

Max listened in fresh amazement. Where on earth had this child of theslums, in the cheap-stuff frock and clumsy shoes, got her education, herrefinement? Her talk was not so very different from that of the West-Enddinner-tables she had laughed at. What did it mean?

"Do you really feel so grateful for the little I have done?" he askedsuddenly. 

The girl drew a long breath. 

"I don't dare to tell you _how_ grateful. "

"Well, then, will you tell me all about yourself? I'm getting morepuzzled every moment. I hope it isn't rude to say so, but--you and thisplace don't _fit_. "

For a moment the girl did not answer. Then she put the paper which hadheld the biscuits carefully into the cupboard by the fireplace, and asshe did so he saw her raise her shoulders with an involuntary andexpressive shrug. 

"I suppose it is rather surprising, " she said at last, as she folded herhands in her lap and kept her eyes fixed upon the red heart of the fire. "It surprises me sometimes. "

There was a pause, but Max would not interrupt her, for he thought fromher manner that an explanation of some sort was coming. At last she wenton, raising her head a little, but without looking at him:

"And very likely it will astonish you still more to hear that in comingto this place I made a change for the better. "

Max was too much surprised to make any comment. 

"If you want to know my name, date of birth, parentage and the rest ofit, " went on the girl, in a tone of half-playful recklessness, "why, Ihave no details to give you. I don't know anything about myself, andnobody I know seems to know any more. Granny says she does, but I don'tbelieve her. "

She paused. 

"Why, surely, " began Max, "your own grandmother--"

"But I don't even know that she is my own grandmother, " interrupted thegirl, sharply. "If she were, wouldn't she know my name?"

"That seems probable, certainly. "

"Well, she doesn't, or she says she doesn't. She pretends she hasforgotten, or puts me off when I ask questions, though any one canunderstand my asking them. "

This was puzzling, certainly. Max had no satisfactory explanation tooffer, so he shook his head and tried to look wise. As long as she wouldgo on talking, and about herself, too, he didn't care what she said. 

"What does she call you?" asked he, after a silence. 

"Carrie--Carrie Rivers. But the 'Rivers' is not my name, I know. It wasgiven me by Miss Aldridge, who brought me up, and she told me it wasn'tmy real name, but that she gave it to me because it was 'proper to haveone. ' So how can I believe Granny when she says that it is not my name?Or at least that she has forgotten whether I had any other? If she hadreally forgotten all that, wouldn't she have forgotten my existencealtogether, and not have taken the trouble to hunt me out, and to takeme away from the place where she found me?"

"Where was that?" asked Max. 

The girl hung her head, and answered in a lower voice, as if her replywere a distasteful, discreditable admission:

"I was bookkeeper at a hotel--a wretched place, where I was miserable, very miserable. "

Max was more puzzled than ever. 

Every fresh detail about herself and her life made him wonder the morewhy she was refined, educated. Presently she looked up, and caught theexpression on his face. 

"That was after Miss Aldridge died, " she said, with a sigh. "I had livedwith her ever since I was a little girl. I can hardly remember anythingbefore that--except--some things, little things, which I would ratherforget. " And her face clouded again. "She was a very old lady, who hadbeen rich once, and poor after that. She had kept a school before shehad me; and after that, I was the school. I had to do all the learningof a schoolful. Do you see?"

"Ah, " said Max, "_now_ I understand! And didn't she ever let you knowwho placed you with her?"

"She said it was my grandmother, " answered Carrie, doubtfully. 

"This grandmother? The one you call Granny?"

"I don't know. You see, Mrs. Higgs never turned up till about ten monthsago, long after Miss Aldridge had died. She died the Christmas beforelast. "

"And how did you get to the hotel?"

"I had to do something. Miss Aldridge had only her annuity. I had doneeverything for her, except the very hardest work, that she wouldn't letme do; and when she died, suddenly, I had to find some way of living. And somebody knew of the hotel. So I went. "

"Where was it?"

"Oh, not so very far from here. It was a dreadful place. They treated mefairly well because I am quick at accounts, so I was useful. But, oh, itwasn't a place for a girl at all. "

"But why didn't you get a better one? Anything would have been better, surely, than coming here, to live like this!"

Max was earnest, impassioned even. The girl smiled mournfully as shejust caught his eyes for a moment, and then looked at the fire again. 

"You don't understand, " she said, simply. "How should you? I should havehad no reference to give if I had wanted another situation. The name ofthe place where I had been living would have been worse than none. "

"But there are lots of places where you could have gone, religious andphilanthropic institutions I think they call themselves, where theywould have listened to what you had to say, and done their best to helpyou. "

Carrie looked dubious. 

"Are there?" said she. "Well, there may be, of course. But I think not. Plenty of institutions of one sort and another there are, of course. Butthose for women are generally for one class--a class I don't belong to. "

Max shuddered. This matter-of-fact tone jarred upon him. It was notimmodest, but it revealed a mind accustomed to view the facts of life, not one nourished on pretty fancies, like those of his sisters. 

"And even if, " she went on, "there were a home, an institution, a girllike me could go to and obtain employment, it wouldn't be a life onewould care for; it would be a sort of workhouse at the best, wouldn'tit?"

"Wouldn't it be better than--this?"

"I don't even know that. Granny's fond of me in her way. That's the onething no sort of institution can give you, the feeling that you belongto some one, that you're not just a number. "

"Well, but you're well educated--and--"

He was going to say "pretty, " but her look stopped him. 

It was almost a look of reproach. 

"Do you think I'm the only fairly-educated girl in London who doesn'tknow how to get a living? Haven't you ever found, in poor, wretchedlittle shops, girls who speak well, look different from the others?Don't you know that there are lots of girls like me who are providedfor, well provided for at the outset, and then forgotten, or neglected, and left to starve, to drift, to get on the best way they can? Oh, surely you must know that! Only people like you don't care to thinkabout these things. And you are quite right, quite right. Why shouldyou?"

Suddenly the girl sprang up and made a gesture with her hands as if todismiss the subject. Max, watching her with eager interest, saw passquickly over her face a look which set him wondering on whosecountenance he had seen it before. In an instant it was gone, leaving alook of weariness behind. But it set him wondering. Who was she? Whowere the mysterious parents of whom she knew nothing?

Carrie glanced at the door which led into the outhouse. The tapping of astick on the stone-flagged floor announced the approach of "Granny" atlast. The girl ran to open the door. 

Max had sprung up from his chair, full of curiosity to see the old ladyof whom Carrie seemed to be somewhat in awe. 

He was rather disappointed. There was nothing at all formidable ordignified about Mrs. Higgs, who was a round-shouldered, infirm old womanin a brown dress, a black-and-white check shawl, and a rusty blackbonnet. 

She stopped short on seeing Max, and proceeded, still standing in thedoorway, to scrutinize with candid interest every detail of hisappearance. When she had satisfied herself, she waved her stick as anintimation to him that he could sit down again, and, leaning on the armof the young girl, crossed the room, still without a word, and took herseat in the one arm-chair. 

As Carrie had said, there was nothing singular or marked about her faceor figure by which one could have distinguished her from the general runof old women of her modest but apparently respectable class. A littlethin, whitish hair, parted in the middle, showed under her bonnet; hereyes, of the faded no-color of the old, stared unintelligently out ofher hard, wrinkled face; her long, straight, hairy chin, rather hookednose and thin-lipped mouth made an _ensemble_ which suggested aharmless, tedious old lady who could "nag" when she was not pleased. 

Conversation was not her strong point, evidently, or, perhaps, thepresence of a stranger made her shy. For, to all Carrie's remarks andinquiries, she vouchsafed only nods in reply, or the shortest of answersin a gruff voice and an ungracious tone. 

"Who is he?" she asked at last, when she had begun to sip her cup oftea. 

She did not even condescend to look at Max as she made the inquiry. 

"A gentleman, Granny--the gentleman I told you of, who came in with mebecause I was afraid to come in by myself. "

"But what's he doing here now? You're not by yourself now. "

Max himself could hardly help laughing at this question and comment. 

"I thought I ought to explain to you my appearance here, " said he, modestly. 

"Very well, then; you can go as soon as you like. "

"Granny!" protested the girl in a whisper; "don't be rude to him, Granny. He's been very kind. "

"Kind! I dare say!"

Max thought it was time to go, and he rose and stood ready to make alittle speech. At that moment there was a noise in the outhouse, andboth Mrs. Higgs and Carrie seemed suddenly to lose their interest inhim, and to direct their attention to the door. 

Then Mrs. Higgs made a sign to Carrie, who went out of the room and intothe outhouse. As Max turned to watch her, the light went out. 

By this time Carrie had shut the door behind her, and Max was, as hesupposed, alone with the old woman. He was startled, and he made anattempt to find the door leading into the outhouse and to follow thegirl; but this was not so easy. 

While he was fumbling for the door, he found himself suddenly seized ina strong grip, and, taken unawares, he was unable to cope with anassailant so dexterous, so rapid in his movements, that, before Max hadtime to do more than realize that he was attacked, he was forced throughan open doorway and flung violently to the ground. 

Then a door was slammed, and there was silence. 

As Max scrambled to his feet his hand, touched something clammy andcold. 

It was a hand--a dead hand. 

Max uttered a cry of horror. He remembered all that he had forgotten. Heknew now that the girl's story was true, and that he was shut in thefront room with the body of the murdered man. 

CHAPTER XI. 

A TRAP. 

Max tried to find the door by which he had been thrown into the room. The upper portion was of glass, he supposed, remembering the red curtainwhich hung on the other side of it. But although he felt with his handsin the place where he supposed the door to be, he found nothing butwooden shelves, such as are usually found lining the walls of shops, andplanks of rough wood. 

He paused, looked around him, hoping that when his eyes got used to thedarkness some faint ray of light coming either through the boarded-upfront or through the glass upper half of the door, would enable him totake his bearings, or, at any rate, to help him avoid that uncanny"something" in the middle of the floor. 

But the blackness was absolute. Strain his eyes as he might, there wasno glimmer of light in any direction to guide him, and he had used uphis last match. So he went to work again with his hands. These roughplanks were placed perpendicularly against the wall to a width of aboutthree feet--the width of the door. Passing his fingers slowly all roundthem, he ascertained that they reached to the floor, and to a height ofabout seven feet above it. Evidently, thought he, it was the door itselfwhich opened into the shop which had been carefully boarded up. As soonas he felt sure of this, he dealt at the planks a tremendous blow withhis fist. He hurt his hand, but did no apparent injury to the door, which scarcely shook. Then he tried to tear one of the boards away fromthe framework to which it was attached, but without result. The nailswhich had been used to fasten it were of the strongest make, and hadbeen well driven in. 

Foiled in his attempt to get out of the room by the way he had come, Maxmoved slowly to the left, and at the distance of only a couple of feetfrom the door found the angle of the wall, and began to creep along, still feeling with hands and feet most carefully, in the direction ofthe front of the shop. 

This side of the room presented no obstacles. The wall-paper was tornhere and there; the plaster fell down in some places at his touch. Aboard shook a little under his tread when he had taken a few paces, butat the next step he made the floor seemed firm enough. 

On turning the next angle in the wall he came to the shop door--the oneleading into the stone passage outside. Here he made another attempt toforce an exit, but it was boarded up as securely as the inner one, andthe window, which was beside it, was in the same condition. 

It by no means increased the confidence of Max as to his own safety toobserve what elaborate precautions had been used by the occupants of thehouse to secure themselves from observation. He could no longer doubtthat he was in a house which was the resort of persons of the worstpossible character, and in a position of the gravest danger. 

While opposite the window, he listened eagerly for some sound in thepassage outside. If a foot-passenger should pass, he would riskeverything and shout for help with all the force of his lungs. 

Even while he indulged this hope, he felt that it was a vain one. It wasnow late; traffic on the river had almost ceased; there was noattraction for idlers on the landing-stage in the cold and the darkness. 

He continued his investigations. 

At the next angle in the wall he came to more shelves, decayed, broken, left by the last tenant as not worth carrying away. And presently hisfeet came upon something harder, colder than the boards; it was ahearthstone, and it marked the place where, before the room was turnedinto a shop, there had been a small fireplace. And on the other side ofthis, near the wall, was a collection of rubbish, over the musty itemsof which Max stumbled as he went. Old boxes, bits of carpet, brokenbricks; every sort of worthless lumber. 

And so, without accident, without incident, without hearing a sound butthe faint noise of his own movements, Max got back to the point where hehad started. 

Then he paused and listened at the inner door. 

In spite of everything, he refused to yield to the suggestion thatCarrie had anything to do with his incarceration. Would she not, onfinding that he had disappeared, make an effort to get him out?

While he was standing between doubt and hope, on the alert for any soundon the other side which should suggest the presence of the girl herselfand give him the cue to knock at the door again, his attention wasattracted by a slight noise which thrilled him to the marrow; for itcame, not from outside, but from some part of the room itself, in whichhe had supposed himself to be alone with the dead body of a man. 

Instantly he put his back to the door and prepared to stand on thedefensive against the expected attack of an invisible assailant. 

That was the awful part of it, that he could not see. For a moment hethought of creeping back to the rubbish heap in the corner and trying tofind, amongst the odds and ends lying there, some sort of weapon ofdefense. But a moment's reflection told him that the act of stooping, ofsearching, would put him more at the mercy of an assailant than ever. There was absolutely nothing to do but to wait and to listen. 

And the noise he heard was like the drawing of a log of wood slowlyalong the floor. This was followed by a dull sound, like the falling ofa log to the earth. 

And then there followed two sounds which made his flesh creep: The firstwas the creaking, and cracking of wooden boards, and the second was aslow, sliding noise, which lasted, intermittently for what seemed anhour. 

When the latter noise ceased something fell heavily to the ground. Thatwas a sound there was no mistaking, and then the creaking went on forwhat seemed a long time, and ceased suddenly in its turn. 

And then, again, there was dead silence, dead stillness. 

By this time Max was as cold as ice, and wet from head to foot with thesweat of a sick terror. What the sounds meant, whence they proceeded, hecould not tell, but the horror they produced in him was unspeakable, never to be forgotten. 

He did not move for a long time after the sounds had ceased. He wantedto shout, to batter with his fists on the doors, the window. But ahideous paralysis of fear seemed to have taken possession of him andbenumbed his limbs and his tongue. 

Max was no coward. He was a daring rider, handy with his fists, a youngman full of spirit and courage to the verge of recklessness, as thisadventure had proved. But courage must have something to attack, or atleast to resist, before it can make itself manifest; and in thissickening waiting, listening, watching, without the use of one's eyes, there was something which smacked of the supernatural, something to dampthe spirits of the bravest man. 

There was nothing to be gained, there was, perhaps, much to be risked, by a movement, a step. So Max felt, showing thereby that he possessed aninstinct of sane prudence which was, in the circumstances, better thanbravery. 

And presently he discerned a little patch of faint light on the floor, which gradually increased in size until he was able to make out that itwas thrown from above, and from the corner above the rubbish heap. 

Max kept quite still. The relief he felt was exquisite. If once he couldhave a chance of seeing the man who was in the room with him, and who hecould not doubt was the person who had thrown him in, Max felt he shouldbe all right. In a tussle with another man he knew that he could holdhis own, and a sight of the ruffian would enable him to judge whetherbribery or force would be the better weapon with him. 

In the meantime he watched the light with anxious eyes, determined notto move and risk its extinction until he had been able to examine everycorner of the little shop. 

And as he looked, his eyes grew round, and his breath came fast. 

There was no counter left, no furniture at all behind which a man couldhide. And the room, except for the rubbish in the corner, a small, straggling heap, was absolutely bare. 

There was no other creature in it, dead or alive, but himself. 

CHAPTER XII. 

ESCAPE. 

An exclamation, impossible to repress, burst from the lips of Max. 

At the same moment he made a spring to the left, which brought him underthe spot in the floor above through which the light was streaming. 

And he saw through a raised trap-door in the flooring above the shrewishface of old Mrs. Higgs, and the very same candle in the very same tincandlestick that he had seen in use in the adjoining room. 

The old woman and the young man stared at each other for a moment insilence. It seemed to Max that there was genuine surprise on her face asshe looked at him. 

"Well, I never!" exclaimed she, as she lowered the candle through thehole, and looked, not only at him, but into every corner of the shop. "Well, I never! How did you get in there, eh?"

Max was angry and sullen. How could he doubt that she knew more about itthan he did! On the other hand, he was not in a position to be as rudeas he felt inclined to be. 

"You know all about that, I expect, " said he, shortly. 

"I? How should I know anything about it? I only know that I lost sightof you very quickly, and couldn't make out where you'd got to. "

"Well, you know now, " said Max, shortly, "and perhaps you'll be kindenough to let me out. "

In spite of himself his voice shook. As the old woman still hesitated, he measured with his eye the distance between the floor where he stoodand the open trap-door above. It was too far for a spring. Mrs. Higgsseemed to divine his thoughts, and she laughed grimly. 

"All right, " said she. "All right. I'll come down. I wonder who can haveput you in there now! It's one of those young rascals from over the way, I expect. They are always up to something. Don't you worry yourself; I'mcoming!"

Her tone had become so reassuring that Max began to wonder whether theold woman might not be more innocent of the trick which had been playedupon him than he had supposed. This impression increased when Mrs. Higgswent on:

"Why didn't you holloa out when you found yourself inside?"

"It wouldn't have been of much use, " retorted Max. "I thumped on thedoor and made noise enough to wake the city. "

"Well, I thought I heard a knock, some time ago, " said Mrs. Higgs, whoseemed still in no hurry to fulfill her promise of coming down. "But Ithought it was nothing of any consequence, as I didn't hear it again. "

"Where were you then?" To himself he added: "You old fool!"

"Eh?" said Mrs. Higgs. 

Max repeated the question. 

"Well, first I was downstairs, and then I came up here. "

At last Max saw in the old woman's lackluster eyes a spark of malice. 

"You're coming to open the door now?" asked he. 

"All right, " said she. 

Down went the trap-door, and the light and the old woman disappearedtogether. Max wished he had asked for a candle, although he doubtedwhether his request would have been complied with. 

And at the end of another five minutes, which seemed like hours, hebegan to have other and graver doubts. He had gone back to his formerplace near the door, and he stood waiting, with more and more eagerness, more and more anxiety, for the promised appearance of Mrs. Higgs. 

Surely, slow as her steps might be, she could have got down by thistime. 

He grew restless, uneasy. The old suspicions--which her appearance andthe artful simplicity of her manner had allayed--rose up in his mindwith fresh vigor. And, to add to his anxiety, he suddenly remembered thepretext Carrie had given to try to get him into the front room. 

She had told him there were things of hers in there which she wanted. Hehad believed her, at least, implicitly. But now he knew that her pretextwas a lie. She also, therefore, had been an accomplice in the plot toget him into this room. 

As this thought came into his mind, he heard again the creaking of theboards, and this time it was accompanied by another sound, faint, intermittent, but unmistakable--the sound of the splashing of waterclose to his feet. 

Turning quickly to the door, he raised his fist and brought it upon theboards with a sounding crash; at the same time he shouted for "Help!"with all the strength of his lungs. He repeated the blow, the cry. 

Again he heard, when he paused to listen, the faint splashing of thewater, the creaking of the boards behind him. Then, just as he raisedhis hand for one more blow on the door, he felt it open a very little, pushing him back. 

And at the same moment a voice whispered:

"Sh-sh!"

Very gradually the door was opened a little farther. A hand caught thesleeve of his coat. It was quite dark outside the door--as dark as inthe front room. 

"Sh-sh!" was whispered again in his ear, as he felt himself drawnthrough the narrow aperture. 

He made no attempt to resist, for he knew, he felt, that the hand wasCarrie's, and that this was rescue. 

When he had passed into the second room, Max was stopped by a warningpressure of the hand upon his arm, and then he felt the touch ofCarrie's lips upon his ear, so close did she come before she utteredthese words:

"Don't make a sound. Come slowly, very quietly, very carefully. You'reall right. "

He heard her close the door through which he had just come, and then helet her lead him, in silence and in the darkness, until they reachedanother door. This she opened with the same caution, and Max, passingthrough with her, found himself, as he knew by the little step down ontothe brick floor, in the outhouse. 

"Who's that?" said a man's voice, startling Max, and confirming in aninstant the suspicions he had had that the outrage to which he had beensubjected was the work of a gang. 

"It's me--Carrie, " said the girl. 

And opening the outer door, she drove Max out with a gentle push, andclosed it between herself and him. 

"Thank God!" was his first muttered exclamation, as he felt the welcomerush of cold night air and felt himself free again. 

But the very next moment he turned back instinctively to the door andattempted to push it open. The latch was gone; he had broken it himself. But the door was now locked against him. 

Of course, this circumstance greatly increased the desire he had for onemore interview, however short, with Carrie. He wanted to understand herposition. Too much interested in the girl to wish to doubt her, gratefulto her for contriving his escape, Max yet found it difficult toreconcile her actions with the honesty her words had caused him tobelieve in. 

However, finding that the door was inexorably closed upon him, he sawthat there was nothing for it but to take himself off into safer if lessinteresting regions as quickly as possible. So he got out on the wharf, through and over the timber, and was on the point of crossing to thedoor in the fence, when he saw a man come quickly through, lock the doorbehind him and make his way through the piles of timber with the easy, stealthy step of a man accustomed to do this sort of thing, and to do itat night. 

Before the man got near him, Max, who had stepped back a little underthe wall of one of the outhouses, was sure that the newcomer was ofdoubtful character. When the latter got out into the light thrown by thestreet-lamp outside the wharf, this impression was confirmed. 

A little man, young, of slight and active build, with a fair mustache, blue eyes and curly, light hair, he was undoubtedly good-looking, although there was something mean and sinister about the expression ofhis face. Max could scarcely see all these details; but, as it was, hemade out enough for him to experience an idiotic pang of something likejealousy, as he made up his mind on the instant that the object of theyoung man's visit was to see Carrie. 

The visitor wore a light overcoat, and had a certain look of being welloff, or, at least, well dressed. 

And, suspicion getting the upper hand again, the thought darted throughthe mind of Max that it was strange to find so many persons--this wasthe third of whom he had knowledge--hovering about the shut-up house, when Carrie had represented herself to have been alone for two wholedays. 

Against his better judgment, Max followed the newcomer, step by step, ata safe distance, and raised himself on the timber in such a way as to beable to watch what followed. 

The man in the light coat made his way with surprising neatness andcelerity over the timber to the door of the outhouse, at which he gavetwo short knocks, a pause, and then two more. 

After waiting for a few moments, the man repeated this signal, moreloudly than before. 

And then the door opened, and Max heard the voice of Carrie, though itwas too dark for him to see her at that distance. 

"You, Dick? Come in. "

And the young man, without answering, availed himself of the invitation;and the door was shut. 

Max stared down at the closed door in perplexity and dismay. In spite ofall his adventures in that very doubtful house, or, perhaps, because ofthem, his interest in Carrie, of the blue eyes and the wonderful voice, was as strong as ever. Hovering between trust and mistrust, he toldhimself at this point that she was nothing in the world but the thieves'decoy he had at first suspected. But in that case, why had he himselfnot been robbed? He wore a valuable watch; he had gold and notes in hispurse. And no attempt had been made to relieve him of either the one orthe other. 

And the foolish fellow began to consider and to weigh one thing with theother, and to become more and more eager to see the girl again if itwere only to upbraid her for her deceit, until he ended by slipping downto the ground, going boldly to the door of the outhouse, and giving twoknocks, a pause, and two knocks more. 

As he had expected, Carrie herself, after an interval of only a fewseconds, opened the door. 

There was a little light in the outhouse, and none outside; and Max, having taken a couple of steps to the left, she at first saw nobody. Soshe made a step forward. Max instantly put himself between her and thedoor. 

On recognizing him, Carrie started, but uttered no sound, no word. 

"I want to speak to you, " said Max, in a low voice. 

But all her boldness of their first interview, her coquetry of thesecond, her quiet caution of the third had disappeared. She was nowfrightened, shy, anxious to get away. 

"Oh, why did you come back? Why did you come back? Go away at once andnever come here again. Haven't you got a lesson?"

Her voice broke; her anxiety was visible. Max was touched, moreinterested than ever. 

"I can't go away, " he whispered back, "until I have spoken to you aboutsomething which is very serious. Can't you come out on the wharf, somewhere where we can talk without anybody over-hearing?"

"Oh, no, oh, no. I must go in. And you must go. Are you a _fool_, "and she stamped her foot with sudden impatience, "to be so persistent?"

"A fool?" echoed Max, half to himself. "By Jove, I think I am. Lookhere, " and he bent down so that he might whisper very close to her ear;"I must set the police on this place, you know; but I want you to getaway out of it first. "

She listened in silence. She waited for him to say more. But he waswaiting on his side for the protests he expected. At last she laughed toherself derisively. 

"All right, " said she. "Set the police on us by all means. Oh, do--do!But--just mention first to your friend, Mr. Horne, that that's whatyou're going to do. Just mention it to him, and see the thanks you'llget for your trouble!"

These words came upon Max with a great shock. In the excitement of hisown adventures in this place, he had quite forgotten his friend, DudleyHorne, and the errand which had first brought him into the neighborhood. He had forgotten, also, what he had from the first only halfbelieved--the girl's words connecting Dudley with a murder committedwithin those walls. 

Now that the remembrance was thus abruptly brought back to him, he feltas if he wanted to gasp for breath. Carrie watched him, and presentlymade a sign to him to follow her. Scrambling out to the open space onthe wharf, she made for the spot close to the water where Max had stoodto watch the man whom Carrie had called "Dick. "

When Max came up to her, the girl was standing close under the eaves ofthe outhouse on the bank, leaning against the wall. He could scarcelysee anything of her face in the darkness, but he was struck by somethingstrangely moving in the tones of her voice as she broke the silence. 

"Look here, " she said, "I want you to make me a promise. Come, it oughtnot to be difficult; for I got you out of a nice mess; remember that. You've got to give me your word that you will say nothing about youradventures to-day, either to the police or to anybody else. "

"I can't promise that. And why on earth do you want me to do so? Surelyyou can have no real sympathy with the people who do the things that aredone in there--"

Carrie interrupted him, breaking in upon him abruptly:

"What things?"

"Murders, and--"

"The murder was done by your friend, not by us. "

"'Us?' Surely you don't identify yourself with these people?"

"I do. They are my friends--the only friends I have. "

"But they are thieves, blackmailers!" said Max, saying not what he knewbut what he guessed. 

"What have they stolen from you? What harm have they done to you oranybody that you know of? All this is because my Granny didn't approveof my having a stranger in, and had you shut into a dark room to giveyou a fright. "

"But you forget you said just now you had got me out of a nice mess. "

"I--I meant that you were frightened. "

"And with good reason. After what I saw and heard in that room, I shouldbe worse than a criminal myself if I didn't inform the police about theexistence of the place. I believe it's one of the vilest dens inLondon. "

Carrie was silent. She did not attempt to ask him what it was that hehad heard and seen while in that room. And Max felt his heart sinkwithin him. He would have had her question, protest, deny. And insteadshe seemed tacitly to take the truth of all his accusations for granted. 

"Don't you see, " he presently went on, almost in a coaxing tone, "thatit's for your own good that you should have to go away? I won'tbelieve--I can't--that you like this underground, hole-and-cornerexistence, this life that is dishonest all through. Come, now, confessthat you don't like it--that you only live like this because you can'thelp it, or because you think you can't help it--and I'll forgive you. "

There was a long pause. Then he heard a little, hard, cynical laugh. Hetried hard to see her face; but although he caught now and then a gleamof the great eyes, the wonderful eyes that had fascinated him, he couldnot distinguish the expression, hardly even the outline of her features. 

When she at last spoke, it was in a reckless, willful tone. 

"Forgive me! What have you to forgive, except that I was fool enough toask you into the house? And if you've suffered for that, it seems Ishall have to, too, in the long run; and I'm not going to say I don'tlike the life, for I like it better than any I've lived before. "

"What!"

"Yes, yes, I tell you. I'm not a heroine, ready to drudge away my lifein any round of dull work that'll keep body and soul together. I'drather have the excitement of living what you call a hole-and-cornerlife than spend my days stitch--stitch--stitching--dust--dust--dusting, as I used to have to do with Miss Aldridge, as I should have to do if Iwent away from here. "

"Well, but there are other things you could do, " pleaded Max, with vaguethoughts of setting his own sisters to work to find this erratic childof the riverside some more seemly mode of life than her present one. 

"What other things?"

"Why, you could--you could teach in a school or in a family. "

"No, I couldn't. I don't know enough. And I wouldn't like it, either. And I should have to leave Granny, who wants me, and is fond of me--"

"And Dick!" burst out Max, spitefully. "You would have to give up thesociety of Dick. "

It was possible, even in the darkness, to perceive that this remarkstartled Carrie. She said, in astonishment which she could not hide:

"And what do you know about Dick?"

"I know that you wouldn't care for a life that is repugnant to everynotion of decency, if it were not for Dick, " retorted Max, with rashwarmth. 

Carrie laughed again. 

"I'm afraid you got your information from the wrong quarter, " said she, quietly. "Not from Dick himself, that's certain. "

There was some relief to Max in this confident assertion, but not much. Judging Dick by his own feelings, he was sure that person had notreached the stage of intimacy at which Carrie called him by hisChristian name without hankering after further marks of her favor. 

"He is fond of you, of course!" said Max, feeling that he had no rightto say this, but justifying into himself on the ground of his wish tohelp her out of her wretched position. 

"Well, I suppose he is. "

"Are you--of course I've no right to ask--but are you fond of him?"

Carrie shook her head with indifference. 

"I like him in my way, " said she. "Not in his way. There's a greatdifference. "

"And do you like any man--in his way?"

The girl replied with a significant gesture of disgust, which had in itnothing of coquetry, nothing of affectation. 

"No, " said she, shortly. 

"Why do you answer like that?"

"Why? Oh, well, if you knew all that I've seen, you wouldn't wonder, youwouldn't want to ask. "

"You won't always feel like that. You won't, when you have got away fromthis hole, and are living among decent people. "

"The 'decent people' are those who leave me alone, " said Carrie, shortly, "as they do here. "

"As who do here? Who are the people who live in that shut-up house, besides you and your Granny, as you call her?"

"I--mustn't tell you. They don't belong to any county families. Is thatenough?"

"Why are you so different now from what you were when we were sitting bythe fire in there? You are not like the same girl! Are you the samegirl?"

And Max affected to feel, or, perhaps, really felt, a doubt whichnecessitated his coming a little closer to Carrie, without, however, being able to see much more of her face than before. 

"I'm the same girl, " replied Carrie, shortly, "whom you threatened withthe police. "

"Come, is that fair? Did I threaten _you_ with the police?"

"You threatened _us_. It's the same thing. Well, it doesn't matter. They won't find out anything more than we choose!"

She said this defiantly, ostentatiously throwing in her lot with thedubious characters from whom Max would fain have dissociated her. 

"Do you forget, " he asked, suddenly, "that these precious friends ofyours left you, forgot you, for two whole days--left you to the companyof a dead man, to a chance stranger? Is that what you callkindness--friendship--affection?"

She made no answer. 

A moment later a voice was heard calling softly: "Carrie?"

The girl came out of the shelter of the eaves, and Max at last caughtsight of her face. It was sad, pale, altogether different from what thereckless, defiant, rather hard tones of her latest words would have ledhim to expect. A haunting face, Max thought. 

"I must go, " said she. "Good-bye. "

"Carrie!" repeated the voice, calling again, impatiently. 

Max knew, although he could not see the owner of the voice, that it was"Dick. " It was, he thought, a coarse voice, full of intimations of theswaggering self-assertion of the low-class Londoner, who thinks himselfthe whole world's superior. 

Carrie called out:

"All right; I'm coming!" And then she turned to Max. "You are to forgetthis place, and me, " said she, in a whisper. 

The next moment Max found himself alone. 

CHAPTER XIII. 

THE SEQUEL TO A TRAGEDY. 

It was on the evening after that of his expedition to Limehouse that MaxWedmore found himself back again at the modest iron gate of the park atThe Beeches. He had not sent word what time he should arrive, preferringnot to have to meet Doreen by herself, with her inevitable questions, sooner than he could help. 

As he shut the gate behind him, and hurried up the drive toward thehouse, he felt a new significance in the words "Home, Sweet Home, " andshuddered at the recollection that he had, in the thirty odd hours sincehe left it, given up the hope of ever seeing it again. 

It was a little difficult, though, on this prosaic home-coming, torealize all he had passed through since he last saw the red house, withits long, dignified front, its triangular pediment rising up against thedark-blue night sky, and the group of rambling outbuildings, stables, laundries, barns, all built with a magnificent disregard of the value ofspace, which straggled away indefinitely to the right, in a grove of bigtrees and a tangle of brush-wood. 

Lines of bright light streaming between drawn window curtains showedbright patches on the lawn and the shrubs near the house. As Max passedthrough the iron gate which shut in the garden from the park, a group ofmen and boys, shouting, encouraging one another with uncouth cries, rushed out from the stable yard toward the front of the house. 

"What's the matter?" asked Max of a stable boy, whom he seized by theshoulders and stopped in the act of uttering a wild whoop. 

"It's the log, sir, " replied the lad, sobered by the sudden appearanceof the young master, who seemed in no hilarious mood. 

"The log! What log?"

"Master has ordered one for Christmas, sir, the biggest as could begot, " answered the boy, who then escaped, to rush back and join theshouting throng. 

And Max remembered that his father, in his passionate determination tohave a real old English Christmas, with everything done in the propermanner, had given this order to the head gardener a few days before. 

By this time the group had become a crowd. A swarm of men and boys, conspicuous among whom were all the idlers and vagabonds of theneighborhood, came along through the yard in one great, overwhelmingwave, hooting, yelling, trampling down the flower-beds with, theirwinter covering of cocoanut fiber, breaking down the shrubs, tearingaway the ivy, and spreading devastation as they went. 

Poor Mr. Wedmore had instructed his servants not to prevent thevillagers from joining in the procession. There was somethingreminiscent of feudal times, a pleasant suggestion of the cordialrelation between the lord of the manor of the Middle Ages and histenants and dependents, in this procession of the Yule log up to thegreat house. And Mr. Wedmore, full of his fancy for the grand oldmedieval Christmas festivities, hugged to his heart the thought ofholding such revels as should make Christmas at The Beeches aninstitution in the countryside. 

But, alas! the London merchant had become a country gentleman too latein life to appreciate the great gulf which lies between thesixteenth-century peasant (of the modern imagination) and thenineteenth-century villager of actual fact. His own small army from thestable and the garden were powerless to cope with the disorderly mobthey had been encouraged to invite in this interesting celebration. Andthose most mischievous and conspicuous roughs whom the coachman haddriven off with the whip on the way up, revenged themselves for thisdrastic treatment by coming in through the front gate of the park, breaking down the fence between park and garden, and every obstacle totheir barbaric progress. 

It was "Poaching Wilson" who pulled the bell, after some difficulty infinding the handle, owing to the liberality with which he had "treatedhimself" as a preparation for the journey. 

Max, alarmed at the invasion, had made his way round to thebilliard-room door at the back, bolted it on the inside, and hastened togive directions to the servants to lock all the other doors, and tosecure the ground-floor windows. 

Then he rushed into the hall, just as his father had come out from thedining-room, serviette in hand, to learn the cause of the noise outside. 

"Hello, Max! Is it you back again? And have you brought down half thepopulation of London with you?"

"No, sir, they didn't come with me. They are guests of yours, Iunderstand. And they expect to be treated to unlimited beer, so I gatherfrom their remarks. They've brought some firewood, I believe. "

At this moment the clanging of the front-door bell resounded through thehouse for the second time. The frightened butler, who was a young manand rather nervous, stood by the door, not daring to open it. The ladiesof the household had by this time come out of the dining-room; Mrs. Wedmore looked flush and frightened; the girls were tittering. Smotheredexplosions of laughter came from time to time to the ears of the masterof the house, from the closed door which led to the servants' hall. 

"Shall--shall I see who it is, sir?" asked the butler, who could hearthe epithets applied to him on the other side of the door. 

"No, no!" cried Doreen. "Not on any account! Tell them to put the thingdown and go away. "

There was a pause, during which the bell rang again, and there was aviolent lunge at the door. 

"They won't--they won't go away, Miss, without they get somethingfirst, " said the butler, who was as white as a sheet. 

"Tell them, " began Mr. Wedmore, in a loud tone of easy confidence, "totake it round to the back door, and--and to send a--deputation to me inthe morning; when--er--they shall be properly rewarded for theirtrouble. "

"They ought to reward us for _our_ trouble, papa, don't you think?"suggested Doreen. 

"There! They've begun to reward themselves, " said Queenie, as a stonecame through one of the windows. 

Mr. Wedmore was furious. He saw the mistake he had made, but he wouldnot own it. Putting strong constraint upon himself, he assumed a gaygeniality of manner which his looks belied, and boldly advanced to thedoor. But Mrs. Wedmore flung her arms round her husband in a capaciousembrace, dragging him backward with an energy there was no useresisting. 

"No, no, no, George! I won't have you expose yourself to those horridroughs! Don't open the door, Bartram! Put up the bolt!"

"Nonsense! Nonsense, my dear!" retorted Mr. Wedmore, who was, perhaps, not so unwilling to be saved from the howling mob as he wished toappear. "It's only good-humored fun--of a rough sort, perhaps, but quiteharmless. It's some mischievous boy who threw the stone. But, of course, they must go round to the back. "

"Cook won't dare to open the door to 'em, sir, " said the butler. 

The situation was becoming serious. There was no denying that the housewas besieged. Mrs. Wedmore began to feel like a châtelaine of theCavalier party, with the Roundhead army at the doors clamoring for herhusband's blood. The cries of the villagers were becoming more derisive. 

As a happy thought, Mrs. Wedmore suggested haranguing the mob from anupper window. This course seemed rather ignominious, but prudencedecided in its favor. 

There was a rush upstairs, and Mr. Wedmore, followed by all the ladies, flung himself into the bathroom and threw up the window. 

It was not at all the sort of thing that merry squire of the olden timesmight have been expected to do. In fact, as Doreen remarked, there wereno bathrooms in the olden time to harangue a mob from. But Mr. Wedmore'smedieval ardor being damped, he submitted to circumstances withfortitude. 

"Yah! There 'e is at last!" "'Ow are you, old un?" "Don't put your noseout too fur this cold night!"

These and similar ribald remarks greeted Mr. Wedmore as he appeared atthe window, telling him only too plainly that the merry days of old weregone, never to be restored, and that the feudal feeling which bound (oris supposed to have bound) rich and poor, gentle and simple, in onegreat tie of brotherhood had disappeared forever. 

Doreen and Queenie were secretly enjoying the fun, though they had thesense to be very quiet; but Mrs. Wedmore was in an agony of sympathywith her husband, and of fear for the results of his enterprise. Hebegan a speech of thanks, but the noise below was too great for him tobe heard. Indeed, it was his own servants who did the most towarddrowning his voice by their well-meant endeavors to shout down theinterrupting cries. 

"They're most of them tipsy, I think, " whispered Doreen to her mother, who said, "Sh-sh!" in shocked remonstrance, but secretly agreed with herdaughter's verdict. 

"Throw them some coppers, papa, " suggested the sage and practicalQueenie. 

Mr. Wedmore turned out his pockets, taking care to disperse his largesseas widely as possible. The girls helped him, hunting high and low forcoins, among which, urged by the crowd in no subdued voice to "come downhandsome, " sixpences and shillings presently made their welcomeappearance. 

"Oh, the hollies!" whispered Doreen to her sister. 

"Thank goodness, the look of the garden to-morrow morning will be anobject-lesson to papa!"

For the invaders, well aware of the value of such wares at Christmastime, filled out the pauses by slashing at the berry-bearing trees withtheir pocket-knives, secure in the safety of numbers. 

By the time the shower of money ceased the crowd had begun to thin;those members of it who had been lucky enough to secure silver coins hadmade off in the direction of the nearest public-house, and those who hadcut down the holly had taken themselves off with their booty. 

There remained in front of the door, when this clearance had beeneffected, the Yule log itself, the laborers who had drawn it along and agroup of manageable size. 

Max, who had been watching the proceedings from the study, after turningout the light, judged that the moment had come for negotiations tocommence. So he told the butler to throw open the front door, and hehimself invited the unwelcome guests to enter. He had taken theprecaution to have all portable articles removed from the hall and allthe doors locked except that which led to the servants' hall and thestaircases. 

In they came, a little subdued, and with their first disastrous energysufficiently exhausted for them to be able to listen and to do as theywere told. 

The oaken center-table had been pushed on one side, and there was aclear space, wide, carpetless, from the front door to the big stonefireplace opposite. 

"This way with the log! Now, boys, pull with a will!" cried Max, notinsensible to the novelty and picturesqueness of the situation, as amotley crowd, some in smock-frocks, some in corduroy and some in gaitersand great-coats, pressed into the great hall dragging the log after themwith many a "Whoop!" and shout and cry. 

Mr. And Mrs. Wedmore and the two girls hurried downstairs on hearing thedoor open, and stood by the fireplace, with a little glow ofsatisfaction and pleasure at the turn affairs had taken. 

It _was_ a log! Or, rather, it was more than a log; for it was halfa tree. Slowly the huge thing came in, scraping the nicely polishedfloor, rolling a little from side to side, and threatening all thosewithin a yard of it. And then, when its appearance had spreadconsternation through the household, the inevitable question came: Whatwas to be done with it?

The fire-basket had been taken out of the hearth on purpose for itsreception, but it was evident that, even after this careful preparation, to think of burning it whole was out of the question. There was nothingfor it but to send for a saw and to reduce the log then and there to amanageable size. 

This was done, amid considerable noise and excitement, drinking of thehealth of the family by villagers who had been drinking too muchalready, and much scraping of the polished floor by muddy, hob-nailedboots. 

Finally the deputation was got rid of, and the interrupted dinner wasallowed to proceed, much to the comfort of Max, who had eaten nothingsince breakfast, and much to the dismay of Mrs. Wedmore, who was thenable to ascertain the extent of the damage done by the invaders. 

It was lucky for Max that he had arrived at such an opportune moment. His father had been grumbling at the number of visits he had made totown lately, and the young man would have found him in no very goodhumor if he had not discovered to his hand the opportunity of makinghimself conspicuously useful. 

It is scarcely necessary to say that Max did not tell anyone about theadventures he had met with. He knew that he should have to go throughthe ordeal of an interview with his sister, Doreen, who would want toknow a great deal more than he was willing to tell her; but he wastired, and he made up his mind that he would not be interrogated thatevening. So he gave her no opportunity for the confidential talk she wasdying to have with him, but spent the remainder of the evening indutiful attendance upon his mother. 

The following day was Christmas Eve. Max came down late to breakfast, and he had scarcely entered the morning-room when his father handed himthe _Standard_, pointing to a certain paragraph without any commentbut a glance at the girls, as a hint to his son not to make any remarkwhich would recall Dudley and his affairs to their minds. 

The paragraph was as follows:

"SHOCKING DISCOVERY!

"The body of a man was found floating in the river close toLimehouse Pier late yesterday evening. Medical evidence points todeath by violence, and the police are making inquiries. It isthought that the description of the body, which is that of a man ofa Jewish type of countenance, rather under than over the middleheight, aged between fifty and fifty-five, gray hair and short, gray beard, tallies with that given a few days ago by a woman whoapplied at the ---- Street Police Court, alleging that her husbandhad disappeared in the above neighborhood. The police are extremelyreticent, but at the present they have no clue to the authors ofthe outrage. The body awaits identification at the mortuary, and aninquest will be held to-day. "

"I wonder whether Dudley will see that?" said Mr. Wedmore, in a lowvoice, as soon as his daughters were engaged in talk together. "It lookslike the sequel to the other paragraph which upset him so the otherevening, doesn't it? I shall watch the papers for the result of theinquest. It seems to me pretty certain that it was Edward Jacobs. Curious affair, isn't it, that he should be murdered in a slum, aftermaking a fortune at other people's expense? Retribution--justretribution! Curious, isn't it!"

To Max it was so much more than merely "curious, " knowing what he did, that he felt sick with horror. Surely this body, found floating nearLimehouse Pier, was the one he had touched in the dark!

CHAPTER XIV. 

IS IT BLACKMAIL?

Mr. Wedmore repeated his comment: "Curious, isn't it?" before Max couldreply. At last he nodded, and handed back the paper to his father. Thenhe turned his chair toward the fire, and stared at the blazing coals. Hehad lost his appetite; he felt cold, miserable. 

His father could not help noticing that something was wrong with him;and, after watching him furtively for a few minutes, he said, with anabruptness which made Max start:

"Did you see anything of Dudley when you were in town?"

Max changed color, and glanced apprehensively at his father, as iffearing some suspicion in the unexpected question. 

"No, sir, " he answered, after a moment's hesitation. "I called at hischambers; but they told me he had gone away for the holidays and hadleft no address. All letters were to be kept for him till his return. "

Both question and answer had been uttered very softly, but Max saw, bythe look on Doreen's face, as she glanced over from the other side ofthe table, that she guessed what they were talking about, if she had notheard their words. 

"Aren't you going to have any breakfast, Max?" asked she, as she cameround to him. "We've kept everything about for you, and we want thetable. "

"Well, you can have it, " said he, jumping up, quickly, and making forthe door. "I don't want any breakfast this morning. "

"Nonsense. You will not be allowed to leave the room until you have hadsome, " retorted his sister, as she sprang at him and attempted to pinionhis arms. "We allow no ill-temper on Christmas Eve, especially as we'vegot a surprise for you--a beautiful, real surprise. Guess who is comingthis morning to stay till New Year!"

Queenie had come up by this time, and the two girls between them broughttheir brother back to the table, where the younger sister began to pourout his coffee. 

But Max refused to show the slightest interest in the coming guest, andwould not attempt to guess who it was. So they had to tell him. 

"It was all on your account that we asked her, " said Doreen, hurt by hisindifference. "You took such a fancy to her, and she to you, apparently, at the Hutchinsons' dance, that we thought you'd be delighted. _Now_, don't you know who it is?"

To their great disappointment, both girls saw that he didn't. Mr. Wedmore, from the other end of the room, was observing this littleincident with considerable annoyance. The young lady in question, MissMildred Appleby, was very pretty, and would be well dowered, and Mr. Wedmore had entered heartily into the plan of inviting her to spendChristmas with them, in the hope that Max would propose, be accepted, and that he would then make up his mind to settle. 

"Why, it's Mildred Appleby, " said Doreen, impatiently, when herbrother's blank look had given her the wrong answer. "Surely, you don'tmean to say you've forgotten all about her?"

"Oh, no, I remember her, " answered Max, indifferently. "Tall girl with afashion-plate face, waltzes pretty well and can't talk. Yes, I rememberher, of course. "

"Is that all you have to say about her?" cried Doreen, betraying herdisappointment. "Why, a month ago she was the nicest and the jolliestand the everythingest girl you had ever met. "

"He's seen somebody else since then, " remarked the observant Queenie, inher dry, little voice. "When he was in town yesterday, perhaps. "

Max looked at his sister with a curious expression. Was she right? Hadhe, in that adventurous thirty-six hours in London, seen somebody whotook the color out of all the other girls he had ever met? He askedhimself this question when Queenie's shrewd eyes met his, and heremembered the strange sensation he had felt at the touch of Carrie'shand, at the sound of her voice. 

Before he could answer his sister, Mr. Wedmore spoke impatiently:

"Rubbish!" cried he, testily. "Every young man thinks it the properthing to talk like that, as if no girl was good enough for him. MissAppleby is a charming girl, and she will find plenty of admirers withoutwaiting for Max's valuable adoration. "

He had much better not have spoken, blundering old papa that he was. Andboth daughters thought so, as they saw Max raise his eyebrows and gatherin all the details of the little plot in one sweeping glance at thefaces around him. He drank his coffee, but he could not eat. Doreen satwatching him, ready to spring upon him at the first possible moment, andto carry him off for the _tête-à-tête_ he was so anxious to put off. 

What should he tell his sister of that adventure of his in the slums ofthe East End? Would she be satisfied if he told a white lie, if he saidhe had found out nothing?

Max felt that Doreen would not be satisfied if he got himself out of thedifficulty like that. In the first place, she would not believe him. Hesaw that her quick eyes had been watching him since his return, and hefelt that he had been unable to hide the fact that something of greatersignificance had occurred during that brief stay in town. What thenshould he tell her? Perfect frankness, perfect confidence was out of thequestion. To look back now, in the handsome, spacious house of hisparents, from the snug depths of an easy-chair, on the time he hadpassed on and about the wharf by the docks, was so strange that Maxcould hardly believe in his own experiences. 

Who would believe the story of his adventures, if he himself couldscarcely do so? Would Doreen, would anybody give credence to the storyof the dead body that he touched, but never saw, the eyes that looked athim from an unbroken wall, the girl who lured him into the shut-uphouse, and then let him out again with an air of secrecy and mystery?

The transition had been so abrupt from the gloomy wharf, with itssuspicious surroundings and the heavy, fog-laden air of the riverside, back to the warmth and light and brightness of home, that already hisadventures had receded into a sort of dreamland, and he began to askhimself whether Carrie, with her fair hair and moving blue eyes, hervibrating voice and changeful expression, were not a creature of hisimagination only. 

He was still under the influence of the feelings roused by this dreamyremembrance, when he snatched the opportunity afforded by Doreen's beingcalled away by Mrs. Wedmore, to go out into the grounds, on his way tothe stables. A ride through the lanes in the frosty air would, hethought, be the best preparation for the trying ordeal of thatinevitable talk with Doreen, whose wistful eyes haunted him as shewaited for a chance of speaking to him alone. 

In the garden a scene of desolation met his eye. 

The lawns were torn up and trodden down; the gravel path from thestables looked like a freshly plowed field; every tree and every bushbore the marks of the marauder. 

The head gardener was in a condition of unapproachable ferocity, and itwas generally understood that he had given notice to leave. Theunder-gardeners kept out of the way, but could be heard at intervalschecking outbursts of derisive laughter behind the shrubberies. Thestory of the Yule log and its adventures was the best joke the countryhad had for a long time, and it was bound to lose nothing as it passedfrom mouth to mouth. And poor Mr. Wedmore began to dread the ordeal ofcongratulations he would have to go through when he next went to church. 

Max felt sorry for his father. As he entered the stable-yard, which wasa wide expanse of flagged ground at the back of the house, round whichwere many outbuildings, he came upon a group of snickering servants, allenjoying the story of the master's freak. 

The group broke up guiltily on the appearance of Max, the laundry-maidstaking flight in one direction, while the stablemen became suddenly busywith yard-broom and leather. 

Max put a question or two to the groom who saddled his horse for him. 

"There was no great harm done last night, was there, except in thegarden? You have not heard of anything being stolen, eh?"

"Well, no, sir. But it brought a lot of people up as had no businesshere. There was a person come up as we couldn't get rid of, askingquestions about the family, sir; and about Mr. Horne, too, sir. Shewouldn't believe as he wasn't here, an' she frightened some of thewomen, I believe, sir. They didn't know where she'd got to, an' nobodysaw her go out of the place, so they've got an idea she's hiding about. A fortune-telling tramp, most likely, sir, " added the man, who wished hehad held his tongue about the intruder when he saw how strongly theyoung master was affected by this story. 

The fact was that Max instantly connected this apparition of a woman"who asked questions about Mr. Horne" with the ugly story told him atthe house by the wharf, and he was glad that Dudley was not spendingChristmas at The Beeches. 

He was oppressed during the whole of his ride by this suggestion thatthe questionable characters of the wharfside were pursuing Dudley; itgave color to Carrie's statement that it was Dudley who killed the manwhom Max believed to have been Edward Jacobs; and it looked as if theobject of the woman's visit was to levy blackmail. 

Or was it--could it be that the woman was Carrie, and that her objectwas to warn Dudley? To associate Carrie herself with the levying ofblackmail was not possible to the susceptible Max in the present stateof his feelings toward her. 

And, just as he was meditating upon this mystery, all unprepared for ameeting with his sister, Doreen waylaid him. He was entering the houseby the back way, muddy from his ride, when she sprang upon him from anambush on the stairs. 

"I've been waiting all the morning to catch you alone, " said she, as sheran out from behind the tall clock and seized his arm. "You've beentrying to avoid me. Don't deny it. I say you have. As if it was any use!No, you shall not go upstairs and take off your boots first. You willjust come into the study, mud and all, and tell me--tell me what you_know_, not what you have been making up, mind! I'm going to havethe truth. "

"Well, you can't, " returned her brother, shortly, as he allowed himselfto be dragged across the hall, which looked cheerless enough without afire, and with the great, clumsy, hideous, maimed old Yule log fillingup the fireplace and reminding everybody of all that it had cost. 

Doreen pushed him into the study and shut the door. 

"Why can't I know the truth?" asked she, eying him steadily. "Do youmean that you have found out Dudley doesn't care for me. "

Max glanced at his sister's face, and then looked away. He had not knowntill that moment, when he caught the tender look of anxiety in her bigbrown eyes, how strong her love of Dudley was. An impulse of angeragainst the man seized him, and he frowned. 

"Why, surely you know already that he doesn't care for you, in the wayhe ought to care, or he would never have neglected you, never have givenyou up!" said he, ferociously. 

"I'm not so sure about that. At any rate I want to know what you foundout. Don't think I'm not strong enough to bear it, whatever it is!"

"Well, then, I'll tell you. He _is_ off his head. He has got mixedup in some way with a set of people no sane man would trust himself withfor half an hour, and--and--and--well, they say--the people say he's donesomething that would hang him. There! Is that enough for you?"

He felt that he was a brute to tell her, but he could see no other wayout of the difficulty in which her own persistency had placed him. Shestared at him for a few seconds with blanched cheeks, clasping herhands. Then she said in a whisper:

"You don't mean--murder?"

Her brother's silence gave her the answer. 

There was a long pause. Then she spoke in a changed voice, under herbreath:

"Poor Dudley!"

Max was astonished to see her take the announcement so quietly. 

"Well, now you see that it is impossible to do anything for him, don'tyou?"

"Indeed, I do not!" retorted Doreen, with spirit. "We don't know thestory yet. We don't know whether there is any truth in it at all; or, ifthere is, what the difficulties were that he was in. Look, Max. You mustremember how worried he has been lately. I have heard him make excusesfor people who did rash things, and I have always agreed with him. Yousee, I knew how good-hearted he was, and I know that he would never havedone anything mean or underhand or unworthy. "

"Don't you call murder, manslaughter--whatever it is--unworthy?" askedMax, irritably. 

"Not without knowing something about it, " answered she. "And I thinkthere's generally more to be said for the man who commits murder thanfor any other criminal. And--and"--her voice gave way and began to shakewith tears--"I don't care what he's done, I'm sorry for him. I--I wantto help him, or--or, at least, I want to see him to tell him so!"

Max was alarmed. Knowing the spirit and courage of his brilliant sister, he was afraid lest she should conceive the idea of starting off herselfon some mad enterprise; so he said hastily:

"He's away now, you know. He's gone without leaving any address. PerhapsI was wrong, after all. Perhaps when he comes back he will be himselfagain, and--and everything will be cleared up. We can only wait andsee. "

But this lame attempt at comfort met with no warm response from hissister. She looked at him with a poor little attempt at a contemptuoussmile, and then, afraid of breaking down altogether, sprang up from thearm-chair in which she had been sitting and left him to himself. 

Max did not recover his usual spirits at luncheon, where everybody elsewas full of mirthful anticipation of the household dance, another ideaof Mr. Wedmore's, which was to be a feature of the evening. And afterthat meal, instead of offering to drive to the station to meet MissAppleby, as everybody had expected, Max took himself off, nobody knewwhere, and did not return home until dusk. 

Coming through a little side gate in the park, he got into the greatyard behind the house, where the stables stood on one side and a hugebarn, which was only used as a storage place for lumber, on the other. And it occurred to him that if the woman of whom the groom told him werestill hanging about the premises, as the servants seemed to think, thiswas the very place she might be expected to choose as a hiding-place. 

So he pushed open the great, creaking door of the barn and went in. Itwas very dark in there, and the air was cold and damp. A musty smellfrom old sacks, rotting wood and mildewed straw came to his nostrils, ashe made his way carefully over the boards with which the middle part ofthe barn had, for some forgotten purpose or other, been floored. 

Little chinks of light from above showed great beams, some with ropeshanging from them, and stacks of huge lumber of fantastic shapes toright and left. 

Max stood still in the middle of the floor and listened for a sound. Buthe heard nothing. Suddenly he thought of the signal by the use of whichhe had summoned Carrie to the door of the house by the wharf. 

Getting close to one of the piles of lumber, he gave two taps on thepanel of a broken wooden chest, waited a couple of seconds, and thengave two taps more. 

There was a shuffling noise along the boards on the other side of thestack, followed by the striking of a match. 

Max was around the obstacle in a moment. Holding a piece of candle inher bony hand was Mrs. Higgs. 

"Hello!" said he. 

She said nothing. But the candle shook in her hand, and by the glassylook of dull yet fierce surprise in her colorless eyes Max saw that thiswoman, who had connived at his imprisonment in the room with the deadman, had never expected to see him again--alive. 

CHAPTER XV. 

MR. WEDMORE'S SECOND FREAK. 

Even if Max had not had such an ugly experience of the ways of Mrs. Higgs, even if this meeting with her in the barn had been his first, hissensations would hardly have been agreeable ones. There was somethinguncanny about the old woman, something which her quiet, shufflingmovements and her apparent lack of interest in what went on around heronly served to accentuate. Even now, while suffering the shock of agreat surprise, Max could feel rather than see the effect which theunexpected meeting had upon her. 

For she uttered no cry, no word; her eyes scarcely opened wider thanbefore. Her jaw dropped a little, and then began to move rapidly up anddown; that was all. And yet, as Max looked at her--at this helpless, infirm old creature with the palsied hands and the lackluster eyes--heshivered. 

"You vile old hag!" thought he to himself. And then his thoughts flew toCarrie, and he asked himself what the attraction could be which boundher to this wicked old woman. 

Mrs. Higgs, after staring at him in dead silence for what seemed a longtime, asked, as composedly as if their meeting had been the most naturalthing in the world:

"Where's your friend, young man?"

"W--what friend?" stammered Max. 

"Oh, you don't know, I suppose!" retorted Mrs. Higgs, derisively. "Nomore than you know what you wanted to come spying about Plumtree Wharffor, eh?"

Max made no answer. There came a vixenish gleam into the old woman'sfaded eyes. 

"What did you come for, eh?" pursued she, sharply. "Who sent you? Nothe, I know! When he's got anything to do at the wharf he comes himself. "

And Mrs. Higgs gave an ugly, mirthless chuckle. 

As Max stared at the withered, lined face, which was growing each momentmore repulsive in his eyes, a feeling of horror and of intense pity forDudley seized him. To be pursued, as his friend evidently was pursued, by this vicious old hag, was a fate hideous enough to expiate everycrime in the Decalogue. 

A little rapid reflection made him decide that a bold course of defiancewas the best to be taken. Whatever Dudley might have done, and whateverterrors Mrs. Higgs might hold over his head, it was very certain, afterall, that the evidence of such a creature, living in such an undergroundfashion, could never be a serious danger to a man in his position. Dudley himself seemed rather to have lost sight of this fact, certainly;but it could not be less than a fact for all that. 

"Mr. Horne is not likely to trouble you or the rest of the thieves atthe wharf again, " said Max, with decision. "He's gone abroad for aholiday. And if you don't take yourself off at once, or if you turn uphere again, or if you attempt to annoy us or Mr. Horne, in any waywhatever, you'll find the police at your heels before you know where youare. "

Then into her dull eyes there came a look of malignity which made Maxdoubt whether he had done well to be so bold. 

"Thieves, eh? Tell your friend we're thieves, and see what he says tothat! Police, eh? Tell your friend _that_, tell your friend_that_, and see whether he'll thank you for your interference!"

"Mr. Horne is away, as I told you. "

"Away, is he? But he won't be away long. Oh, no; he'll come back--he'llcome back. Or if he doesn't, " added Mrs. Higgs, with complacency, "I'llfetch him. "

"Well, you've got to leave this place at once, " said Max, with decision. "We don't allow strangers in the barn, and if you don't go quietly atonce, I must send somebody to turn you out. "

Mrs. Higgs kept her eyes fixed upon him with her usual blank stare whilehe said this in a very loud and decided tone. When he had finished shesuddenly blew out the light with so much unnecessary force that Max feltsomething like a gust of wind upon his face. 

"Turn me out!" and she laughed harshly. "Turn me out! Send for thepolice to do it, if you like. "

Max went out of the barn, listening to her cackling laugh, and notfeeling comfortable until he had found his way into the open air. He atonce gave orders to the stablemen and gardeners to search the barn andto turn out the strangers they might find there. 

But though they hunted in every corner, they found no one, and Max wasonly too glad to come to the conclusion that Mrs. Higgs had taken hisadvice, and got away with as little delay as possible. 

This incident, however, following so closely on the heels of hisexperiences at the wharf, took away all the zest with which Max shouldhave entered into the programme which, by Mr. Wedmore's special wish, had been prepared for that evening; and while Doreen and Queenie andMildred Appleby and two young nephews of Mr. Wedmore's chattered andlaughed, and made dinner a very lively affair, Max was quiet and whathis cousins called "grumpy, " and threatened to be a wet blanket on theevening's entertainment. 

"Going to have all the servants in to dance Sir Roger!" cried he, indismay, when Doreen told him the news. "Good heavens! Hasn't he had alesson in yesterday's tomfoolery and what came of it? How do theservants like the idea?"

"Of course they hate it, " answered Doreen, "and mamma has been all daytrying to coax the cook to indulge him, and not to walk off and leave usto cook the Christmas dinner. And, of course, this assurance that thenotion was distasteful to everybody had made papa more obstinate thanever. Oh, we shall have a merry time. "

Now, down in the depths of his heart Mr. Wedmore had begun to feel somemisgivings about his plans for keeping Christmas in the good oldfashion. But the first failure, the colossal mistake of the Yule Log, had made him obstinate instead of yielding, and he had set his teeth andmade up his mind that they should all be merry in the way he chose, orthey should not be merry at all. 

The fact was that this prosaic middle-aged gentleman, who had passed thegreater part of his life immersed in day-books and ledgers and thedetails of a busy city man's life, found time hang heavy on his hands inthese prosperous days of his retirement, and in this condition he hadhad his mind inflamed by pictures of the life that was led in TheBeeches by his forerunners, easy-going, hard-riding, hard-drinkingcountry gentlemen, with whom, if the truth were known, he had nothing incommon. 

Fired by the desire to live the life they led, to enjoy it in thepleasant old fashion, it had seemed to him an especially happy custom togive a dance at which masters and servants should join hands and makemerry together. He had never assisted at one of these balls, and herefused to listen to his wife's suggestion that it should take place inthe servants' hall, that the servants should be allowed to invite theirown friends, and that the family should limit itself to one brief dancewith their dependants and then leave them to enjoy themselves in theirown way. 

No, it was his will that the dance should be held in the hall of thehouse, and that the pictures of the Illustrated Christmas Numbers shouldbe realized to the utmost. 

Dinner, therefore, was scrambled over in a hurry, and the family withtheir guests went upstairs to the drawing-room or out to thebilliard-room, while preparations were made for the great event of theevening, the lighting of the Yule Log and Sir Roger de Coverley. 

Then the first mishap occurred in the inopportune arrival of the Rev. Lisle Lindsay, whose rather sedate and solemn appearance cast a slightgloom upon everybody's spirits, which deepened when Queenie whispered toMildred that he looked upon dancing as a frivolous and worldly amusementscarcely to be tolerated and never to be encouraged. 

He soon made an opportunity of devoting himself to Doreen, who wasplaying the lightest of light music at the piano in the corner of theroom. 

It had been a fancy of Mr. Wedmore's, who had his own way in everythingwith his wife, to have this drawing-room, which was large and square andlighted by five windows, three at the front and two at the side, furnished entirely with old things of the style of eighty years back, with Empire chairs, sofas and cabinets, as little renovated as possible. The effect was quaint and not unpleasing; a little cold, perhaps, butpicturesque and graceful. 

The grand piano had a case specially made for it, painted a dullsage-green and finished in a manner to give it a look of the lessmassive harpsichord. 

It was at this instrument that Doreen sat, making a very pretty picturein her white silk, square-necked frock, with bands of beaver fur on thebodice and sleeves and an edging of the same fur round the bottom of theskirt. 

"My purpose in coming here to-night, Miss Wedmore, " said Mr. Lindsay, when he had delivered an unimportant message from the vicar's wife aboutthe church decorations, "was really to bring you my good wishes for thisblessed season. I am afraid I shall have no opportunity of speaking toyou to-morrow, though, of course, I shall see you in the church. "

"Oh, yes, we shall all be at church, " said Doreen, quickly. 

She noted something rather unusual in the curate's manner--a nervousexcitement which presaged danger; and she dashed into an air from "TheShop-Girl" with an energy which was meant to have the effect of checkinghis solemn ardor. 

But the curate had the stuff of a man in him, and did not mean to be putoff. This opportunity was really a good one, for the talk in the room, which his arrival had checked for an instant, was now going on merrily. Mrs. Wedmore did her best to keep up the conversation. Nothing wouldhave pleased her better than to see Doreen transfer her tender feelingfor the discredited Dudley to such a suitable and irreproachable personas Lisle Lindsay. She kept a hopeful eye on the pair at the piano whileshe went on talking to her husband's old friend, Mrs. Hutchinson, whowas staying with them for Christmas. 

"And at the same time, " went on Mr. Lindsay, as he moved his chair alittle nearer, so that, under cover of the music, he could speak withoutbeing overheard, "to speak to you on a subject which is--is--in fact, very near my heart. "

This was worse than Doreen had expected. She glanced round at him withrather a frightened expression. "Oh, don't let us talk aboutanything--anything serious now, " said she. "Just when we shall be goingdownstairs to--to dance--in a few minutes. "

It was a very inconsequent objection to make, and Mr. Lindsay simplyignored it. 

"It is, in fact, about myself that I wish to speak, Miss Wedmore, " hepursued relentlessly. "You cannot have failed to notice what a--what adeep interest I take in all that concerns you. And latterly I haveflattered myself that--"

"But people should never flatter themselves about anything!" criedDoreen, desperately, as she suddenly laid her hands in her lap andturned from the piano to face the worst. "Now I'll give you an example. I flattered myself a little while ago that a man cared a great dealabout me--a man I cared a great deal for myself. And all the while hedidn't; or, at least, I am afraid he didn't. And yet, you know, I can'thelp hoping that perhaps I didn't only flatter myself, after all; thatperhaps he will come back some day and tell me I was right. "

Mr. Lindsay heard her in silence, with his mild eyes fixed on thecarpet. But when she had finished he looked up again, and she wasshocked to find that the gentle obstinacy which had been in his facebefore was there still. 

"I am, indeed, sorry for your disappointment, " he said sweetly. "Orrather I should be if it were such a one that you could not hopeto--to--in fact, to get over it. But--but these are trials which may be, perhaps, only sent to show that you, even you, happily placed as you areand gifted of the Almighty, are human, after all, and not beyondsuffering. And--and it may give you an opportunity of seeing that thereare others who can appreciate you better, and who would only be too gladto--to--to--"

"To step into his shoes!" finished Doreen for him, with a sigh. "I knowwhat you were going to say, and if you won't be stopped, I suppose Imust hear you out. But, oh, dear, I do wish you wouldn't!"

He was not to be put off like that. In fact, he was not to be put off byany available means. He sighed a little, and persisted. 

"I am glad you have guessed what I was going to say, Miss Wedmore, though I should not have put it quite in that way. And why should younot want to hear it? I should have thought that even you must be notquite indifferent to any man's honest feelings of esteem and admirationtoward you!"

Doreen was looking at him helplessly, with wide-open eyes. Did he reallythink any girl was ever moved by this sort of address, deliberatelyuttered, with the words well chosen, well considered? As different aspossible from the abrupt, staccato method used by Dudley in the dear olddays!

"Oh, I'm not indifferent at all!" said she, quickly. "I'm neverindifferent to anything or anybody. But I'm sorry, very sorry that--thatyou should feel--"

She stopped short, looked at him for a moment curiously, and asked withgreat abruptness:

"_Do_ you feel anything in the matter? _Really_ feel, I mean?I don't think you do; I don't think you can. You couldn't speak so_nicely_, if you did. "

He looked at her with gentle reproach. His was not a very tempestuousfeeling, perhaps, but it was genuine, honest, sincere. He thought herthe most splendid specimen of handsome, healthy well-brought-upwomanhood he had ever met, and he thought also that the beneficentinfluence of the Church, exercised through the unworthy medium ofhimself, would mold her into a creature as near perfection as washumanly possible. 

Her way of receiving his advances was perplexing. He was not easilydisconcerted, but he did not answer her immediately. Then he saidsoftly:

"How could I speak in any way but what you call 'nicely' to _you_? Tothe lady whom I am asking to be my wife?"

Doreen looked startled. 

"Oh, don't, please! You don't know what a mistake you're making. I'm notat all the sort of wife for you, really! Indeed, I couldn't recommendmyself as a wife to anybody, but especially to you. "

"Why--especially to me?"

"Well, I'm not good enough. "

"That sounds rather flattering. And yet, somehow, I don't fancy you meanit to be so. "

"Well, no, I don't, " said Doreen, frankly; "for I mean by 'good' a lotof qualities that I don't think highly of myself, such as getting up inthe middle of the night to go to early service, and being civil topeople I hate, and--and a lot of things like that. Don't you know thatI'm eminently deficient in all the Christian virtues?"

This was a question the curate had never asked himself; but it came uponhim at this moment with disconcerting force that she was right. Luckilyfor his self-esteem, it did not occur to him at the same time that itwas this very lack of the conventional virtues, a certain freshness andoriginality born of her defiant neglect of them, which formed thestronger part of her attractiveness in his eyes. 

After a short pause he answered, with his usual deliberation:

"Indeed, I am quite sure that you do yourself injustice. "

"Oh, but I'm equally sure that I don't. I not only leave undone thethings which you would say I ought to do, and do the things which Iought not to do, but I'm rather proud of it. "

Still, Mr. Lindsay would not accept the repulse. He persisted in makingexcuses for her and in believing them. 

"Well, you fulfill your most important duty; you are the happiness andthe brightness of the house. Your father's face softens whenever youcome near him. Now, as that is your chief duty, and you fulfill it sowell, I am quite sure that if you entered another state of life whereyour duties would be different, you would accommodate yourself, youwould fulfill your new duties as well as you did the old. "

Doreen rewarded him for this speech with a humorous look, in which therewas something of gratitude, but more of rebellion. 

"Accommodate myself? No, I couldn't. I think, do you know, that if Iwere ever foolish enough to marry--and it would be foolishness in aspoiled creature like me--I should want a husband who could accommodatehimself to me. Now, you couldn't. Clergymen never accommodate themselvesto anything or anybody. "

The Reverend Lisle Lindsay did at last look rather disconcerted. Mischievous Doreen saw her triumph and made the most of it. 

"So that settles the matter, doesn't it? I can't accommodate myself; youcan't either. What could possibly come of a union like that?"

"The greatest happiness this world is capable of affording, and the hopeof a happiness more abiding hereafter, " said he; "all the happiness thata true woman can bring to the man she loves. "

Doreen threw up her head quickly. 

"Ah! that's just it, " cried she. "'To the man she loves!' But you arenot the man I love, Mr. Lindsay. I suppose it's one of the things Iought not to do--one of the unconventional and so unchristian things--toown that I love a man who doesn't love me. But I do. Now, you know whoit is, and everybody knows; but, for all that, you mustn't tell; youmust keep it as a secret that Doreen Wedmore--proud, stuck-up Doreen--isbreaking her heart for the sake of a man who--who--" Her voice broke andshe paused for a moment to recover herself; then she said, in a lightertone: "Ah, well, we mustn't be hard upon him, either, for we don'tknow--it's so difficult to know. "

She sprang up from her seat; and the curate rose too. By her tactfulmention of her own unlucky love she had softened the blow of herrejection of him. She had been rather too kind indeed, considering thetenacity of the person she had to deal with; for the curate consideredhis case by no means so hopeless as it was; and instead of takinghimself off forlornly, as she would have wished, he stayed on until theyoung men swarmed up from the billiard-room and bore the whole partydown to the hall. 

Mr. Wedmore, in great glee at having carried his point in the face ofthe family resistance, led Mrs. Hutchinson down stairs, and then handedher over to Max, while he himself threw open the door leading to theservants' quarters, and invited the group of neat maids and stalwartyoung men from the garden and stable to enter. 

But here there was a hitch in the arrangements. The cook, in a badtemper, smarting with disapproval of the whole business, had refused tojoin the others, and, as nothing could be done without her, Mr. Wedmorehad to penetrate into the servants' hall, where he found her sitting instate, and, luckily, dressed for the occasion. 

Never in his life had Mr. Wedmore exerted himself so much to please anywoman as he now did to soften the outraged feelings of the cook, who wasa stout, red-faced woman, whose days of comeliness and charm were longsince gone by. He at last succeeded in inducing her to accompany him tothe hall, where he arrived in triumph, with a flushed face and nervousmanner, after an interval which had been put to great advantage by theyounger gentlemen of the party, who were all anxious to dance with theprettiest housemaid. 

Their eagerness had the effect of annoying the rest of the maids, andeffectually spoiling whatever enjoyment they might have got out of thedance in the circumstances, while it by no means pleased the ladies ofthe family and their friends, who stood a little apart and whispered toeach other that this sort of thing was bound to be a failure, and whycouldn't papa, dear old, stupid papa, leave _them_ out of the affair, and let the boys have a romp in the servants' hall without theirassistance?

The pause had made the ladies so frigid and the men-servants so shy, thepretty housemaid so merry and the plain ones so solemn, that disasterthreatened the gathering, when Mr. Wedmore and the cook made theiropportune appearance. 

Max, his cousins and young Hutchinson gave three cheers, in the midst ofwhich demonstration the Rev. Lisle Lindsay endeavored to make his escapeby the front door. 

Unhappily, Mr. Wedmore, elated by his victory over the cook, espied him, and straightway forbade him to leave the house until after "Sir Roger. "In vain the curate protested; pleaded the privileges and exemptions ofhis sacred calling. 

Mr. Wedmore was obdurate; and, to the disgust of everybody, includinghimself, the Rev. Lisle Lindsay found himself told off to dance with thepretty housemaid, being the only man in the room who was not anxious forthe honor. 

This mishap cast a gloom over the proceedings. The rest of the gentlemenfound it hard to extract a word from the other maids, who all consideredthemselves slighted. And Mr. Wedmore had great difficulty in persuadingthe men-servants to come forward and take their places by the partnershe chose for them. To get them to choose for themselves was out of thequestion, after one young gardener had availed himself of the invitationby darting across the floor and asking Miss Queenie, in a hoarse voiceand with many blushes, if she would dance with him. 

Of course, this piece of daring made a sensation so great that to getanother man follow the bold example was impossible. 

In the end, Mrs. Wedmore found a partner in the coachman, who was aportly and solemn person, with no talents in the way of dancing or ofconversation. Doreen danced with the butler, who, between nervousnessand gloom, found it impossible to conceal his opinion that master wasmaking a fool of himself; and the rest of the company being quite as illmatched, "Sir Roger" was performed with little grace and lessliveliness, while the Yule Log, after emitting a great deal of smoke, sputtered out into blackness, to everybody's relief. 

The end of it was, however, a little better than the beginning. As thedancers warmed to their work, their latent enthusiasm for the exercisewas awakened; and "Sir Roger" was kept up until the fingers of theorganist, who had been engaged to play for them on a piano placed in acorner of one of the passages, ached with the cold and with the hardwork. 

When the dance was over and the party had broken up, Doreen, who haddone her best to keep up the spirits of the rest, broke down. Max mether on her way to her room, and saw that the tears were very near hereyes. 

"What's the matter now?" said he, crossly. "You seemed all rightdownstairs. I thought you and Lindsay seemed to be getting on very welltogether. "

"Did you? Well, you were wrong, " said she, briefly, as she shut herselfinto the room. 

CHAPTER XVI. 

A MESSAGE FROM THE WHARF. 

Christmas was over, and The Beeches had subsided into its normal stateof prosperous tranquility. Max had had a fresh situation discovered forhim, and he was now wasting his time on a stool in a merchant's office, as he had wasted it in other offices many times before. His father'schronic state of exasperation with his laziness was growing acute, andhe had informed Max that unless he chose to stick to his work this timehe would have to be shipped off to the Cape. No entreaties on the partof Mrs. Wedmore or the girls were of any avail against this fixedresolution on Mr. Wedmore's part, or against the inflexible laziness ofMax himself. He detested office work, and he confessed that if he wasnot to be allowed to lead the country life he loved, he would preferenlistment in the Cape Mounted Police to drudgery in a dark corner of acity office. 

It was on a foggy evening in January that Max, for the first time inthree weeks (an unprecedented interval), knocked at the door of DudleyHorne's chambers. 

There was a long delay, and Max, after a second knock, was going towithdraw, in the belief that Dudley was not in, after all, when he heardslow steps within, and paused. 

The door was opened a very little way, and Dudley looked out. 

Max stared at him for a moment without speaking. For over his friendthere had passed some great change. Dudley had never been florid ofcomplexion, but now he looked ghastly. His face had always been graveand strong rather than cheerful, but now the expression of hiscountenance was forbidding. 

He looked at Max, glanced down the stairs, and nodded without a smile. 

"Hello!" said he, with the letter of familiarity, but without itsspirit. "Haven't seen anything of you for a century. Up in town again, eh?"

"Yes. Can't I come in?" said Max. 

Dudley had come outside instead of inviting his friend in. At thesewords, however, he turned abruptly, and himself led the way into thelittle ante-chamber. 

"Oh, yes, oh, yes, come in, of course. Come in. "

Max accepted the cool invitation in silence, shut the door behind him, and followed his friend into the sitting-room, where the table was laidfor a solitary dinner. 

But it was the writing-table which caught the eye of Max and riveted hisattention. For a photograph lay there, a woman's photograph, and as itwas just in front of the chair Dudley had been using, as if he had beenoccupied in looking at it, it was not unnatural that the brother ofDoreen should be curious to know whose picture it was. 

So Max got around the table quickly by the opposite way to that whichDudley took, and threw himself into a chair by the writing-table in sucha position that he could see what was on it. And he saw two things: Onewas that the photograph was that of Doreen; the other that a postalorder for one pound, which lay beside the photograph, and upon which theink was not yet dry, was made out to "Mrs. Edward Jacobs. "

Max felt himself blushing as Dudley snatched up the postal orders--therewere two of them--and slip them into an envelope. Then the eyes of thetwo men met. And Dudley knew what Max had seen. 

He seemed to hesitate a moment, then glanced at Max again, sat down tothe writing-table, and took up a pen. As he directed the letter, he saidquietly:

"Do you know whom I'm sending this money to?"

"Well, I did catch sight of the name, " stammered Max, unable to hide thefact that the question was an embarrassing one to him. 

"Yes, " went on Dudley, as he showed him the directed letter, "it is tothe widow of the poor devil who was found in the Thames the otherday--man who was once in my late father's employment--Edward Jacobs. "

"Oh, yes, I've heard, " stammered Max again. 

The incident of Dudley sending money to the woman would have seemed tohim trivial and even natural enough, if it had not been for the curiouslook of hard defiance which Dudley gave him out of his black eyes. Itwas like a challenge; it set his friend wondering again, asking himselfagain all those tormenting questions about Edward Jacobs's death whichhe had allowed to slip into a back place in his thoughts. 

As he looked down at the end of the white table-cloth which touched thefloor a loud laugh from Dudley startled him and made him look up. Andwhen he did so the conviction that his friend was mad, or, at least, subject to attacks of insanity, flashed into his mind more strongly thanever. Dudley was leaning back, tilting his chair till it touched thedinner table, distending his jaws in a hard, mocking laugh as unlikemirth as possible. 

"Oh, yes, so I've heard--so I've heard!" repeated he, mockingly. "And, of course, that's all you've heard, isn't it? And you've never taken thetrouble to make any personal inquiries in the matter? Or thought oftaking a journey, say, as far as Plumtree Wharf to make any privateinvestigations?"

Max was startled. He saw clearly enough that which he would fain havedenied--that Dudley was in communication with the people at the wharf, from whom he must have obtained this information. For a moment he wassilent. It was not until Dudley's harsh laughter had died away, and he, rather surprised to see how quietly Max took his accusation, had wheeledround in his chair to look at his friend, that Max said:

"Well, I did go to the wharf. And I'll tell you why. Doreen is breakingher heart about you, and she would have me find out what was wrong withyou. "

Then there was silence. 

"God bless her!" said Dudley at last, in a hoarse whisper. 

Another silence. 

"What did you tell her?" whispered Dudley. 

"What could I tell her? I said you were mad. "

"And what did you--_think_?"

"Well, I hardly know myself. "

"That's right! That's the proper attitude!" cried Dudley. 

And then he laughed again uproariously. 

And in the midst of his laughter there was a knock at the door. 

For a moment neither man moved. Then Dudley got up slowly and walked outof the room, closing the door behind him. Max heard him open the outerdoor, and then he heard a voice he knew--a young girl's voice--say:

"This is Mr. Dudley Horne's place, and you are Mr. Dudley Horne?"

"Yes. "

"Then let me come in. I've come from--"

The voice dropped, and Max did not catch the rest. 

"Stop! I'll speak to you here, " said Dudley, trying to keep her in thelittle ante-room. 

But the girl came straight in. It was Carrie. 

CHAPTER XVII. 

A SORCERESS. 

Max was standing on the other side of the lamp, and Carrie did not seehim. She announced her errand at once in a straightforward andmatter-of-fact manner. 

"Dick Barker's been nabbed for stealing a watch. You've got to get himoff. "

"What do you mean? I've got to get him off?" cried Dudley, indignantly. 

Carrie laughed. 

"It's the message I was told to give you; that's all. "

"Well, take this message back: that I refuse to have anything to do withyour pickpocket. "

Carrie turned to the door. 

"All right. I'm to say that to Mrs. Higgs?"

"Stop!" thundered Dudley. 

Carrie paused, with her hand on the door. 

"Did Mrs. Higgs send you?"

"Yes. "

"Then wait a minute. "

All the indignation, all the defiance, had gone from his tone. He lookedanxious, haggard. 

Carrie sat down like an automaton in the chair nearest to the door. 

There was a silence of some minutes' duration when Carrie announcedherself as a messenger from Mrs. Higgs. 

Dudley, who had either forgotten the presence of Max or was past caringhow much his friend learned, since he already knew so much, walked upand down between the fireplace and the bookcase on the opposite wall, evidently debating what he should do. Carrie never once raised her eyesfrom the carpet, but sat like a statue beside the door, apparently asindifferent as possible as to the message she should take back. 

Max had risen from his seat and was standing where he could get a fullview of her over the lamp on the dinner-table between them. Perhaps itwas the yellow paper shade around the light which made the young girl'sface look so ghastly, or the rusty black clothes she wore. A plainskirt, the same that she had worn when he saw her first, a black stuffcape of home-made pattern, and a big black straw hat which had evidentlydone duty throughout the summer; all were neatly brushed and clean, butwell-worn and lusterless, and they heightened the appearance of deadlypallor which, struck Max so much. 

Her eyes he could not see; her scarlet lips were tightly closed, and herface seemed to him to wear an air of dogged determination which helpedhim to understand how it was that she had escaped the perils of herunprotected girlhood. Certainly it would have taken a good deal ofcourage, impudence or alcoholic excitement to make a man address to thisstatuesque and cold-faced creature a flippant word. 

She did not see Max, who kept so quiet that it was easy for her tooverlook the presence of a third person in the room. He watched herintently, taking even more interest in her under these new conditionsthan he had done before. Would she retain her cold look and manner whenhe made his presence known to her, as he intended presently to do? Thequestion was full of interest to him. 

Presently Dudley stopped short in his walk, right in front of Carrie, who seemed, however, unconscious of or indifferent to the fact. 

"Who are you?" he asked, abruptly. 

Carrie looked up and surveyed him as if from a great distance. 

"I don't know, " she answered, rather quaintly, but evidently unconsciousof the oddity of her own answer. There was a moment's pause, and thenshe asked, briskly:

"However, that doesn't matter to you, does it?"

"Well, yes, it does. You come here as a messenger. Now, I want to knowyour credentials. "

"I don't know what you mean. I live with Mrs. Higgs. She makes me callher 'Granny. '"

Dudley at once became strongly interested. 

"Live with her, do you, and call her Granny? I've never seen you when Ihave visited Mrs. Higgs. "

"I've seen you, though. I've seen--"

She stopped. 

Dudley's hand, the one Max could see from where he stood, movedconvulsively. After another short pause, Carrie raised her head, andtheir eyes met. Each evidently saw something oddly interesting in theface of the other. 

"I shall have to make some inquiries about you, " said he at last. 

"Very well. You can go and make them. "

Her tone was matter-of-fact, but neither impudent nor defiant. She didnot seem to care. 

"This Dick Barker, who has been nabbed, as you elegantly express it, issome sweetheart of yours, I suppose? And you have persuaded Mrs. Higgsto send me this absurd message, asking me to appear for him?"

"No. He's nothing to me. Mrs. Higgs wants him got off, because if he'sconvicted he'll tell all he knows, or at least enough to set the policeon. "

"And what is that to me?"

Another pause, during which she looked down. Then Carrie raised her eyesagain, and looked at him steadily. 

"Oh, well, you know best. "

Dudley turned away, muttering something under his breath. But the nextmoment he faced her again. 

"And you are waiting to take my answer back?"

"Mrs. Higgs said there would be no answer. "

"Then what are you waiting for?"

"To see whether there is one or not. "

"And you're going straight back with it to your granny, whatever it is?"asked Dudley, with the same sharp tone of cross-examination. 

"No. I am not going back to her. But I shall give the message to someone who is. "

There was another pause, longer than any of the previous ones. ThenDudley said, shortly:

"You need not wait here any longer. I am going to see her myself. "

Carrie had got upon her feet in the automatic manner she had maintainedthroughout the interview. 

"Going to the wharf, are you?" she said, with the first sign of humaninterest she had shown. "Oh, very well. "

There was something noticeable in her tone, something which made Maxsuspicious and anxious on his friend's account. He came round the tablewith rapid steps, touched Dudley's shoulder, and said, in a low voice:

"I'll go with you!"

At the sound of his voice Carrie started violently, and looked up atMax, staring with eyes full of wonder and something very like delight. The rigidity with which she had held herself, the automatic manner, thehard, off-hand tone, all disappeared at once; and it was a new, atransformed Carrie, the fascinating, wayward, irresistible girl he hadremembered, who gave him a smile and a nod, as she said, in a voice fullof the old charm he remembered:

"You! Is it you?" Then, breathlessly, with a change to anxiety in hervoice: "And are you going, too?"

"Yes. I'm going with my friend, " said Max, as he came forward and heldout a hand, into which she put hers very shyly; "from what I remember ofmy visit to your place, I think two visitors are better than one. "

"I don't know whether granny will think so, " said Carrie, still in thesame altered voice. 

She was shy, modest, charming. All her femininity had returned, and boththe young men felt the influence of the change. 

Dudley, who had instinctively stepped back to make way for his friend, was watching them both with surprise and uneasiness. 

"We must risk Mrs. Higgs's displeasure, " said Max, dryly, "unless, indeed, Dudley, " and he turned to his friend, "you will give up thisexpedition altogether, as I strongly advise. "

But Dudley had made up his mind. He did not want Max to go with him, buthe was resolved to go to the wharf. And his friend's heart failed withinhim at the news. 

"Don't you think it would be advisable to get a policeman to accompanyyou?" he hazarded in a low voice. 

But Dudley started violently at the suggestion. 

"Policeman!" repeated he in a louder tone than Max had used. "Goodheavens, no!"

Max, looking round, saw that Carrie had overheard; but she betrayed noemotion at the suggestion, even if she felt any. 

Dudley pulled out his watch. 

"I have an appointment for this evening, " said he; "I must get out ofit. Max, if you persist in going with me to the wharf, you're a fool. When your friends are doing well, you should stick to them; when theyhave got into a mess, you should have appointments elsewhere. " Althoughhe spoke cynically, there was underneath his scoffing tone a strain oftenderness. He turned quickly to the girl at this point, as if afraid ofbetraying more feeling than he had intended to do. "You've deliveredyour message, " said he, sharply, "now you can go. "

But Carrie lingered. Looking shyly at Max, she said in a low voice:

"Have you made up your mind that you will go with him?"

"Yes, " said Max. 

"All right, " nodded Carrie. "Then I'll go, too. "

Dudley looked down at the girl with an impatient frown on his face. 

"Supposing we don't want you?" said he, dryly. 

"You will, " she answered briefly, without even looking at him. 

Dudley considered for a moment, and then said shortly:

"All right. We may as well keep an eye on you. "

Carrie laughed, and then remained silent. As for Max, he was struck withan odd likeness between the girl's dry, short manner of speaking toDudley and Dudley's manner of speaking to her. 

At that moment there was an interruption in the shape of the waiter froma neighboring restaurant, who came in with the dinner Dudley had orderedfor himself. 

"I shan't want it now, " said Dudley, as the man put down the covereddishes on the table. 

"Why, surely you're not in such a hurry that you haven't time to dine?"said Max. 

Dudley made an impatient gesture. 

"I can get a biscuit somewhere, if I want it. I can't eat just now. "

"Let me eat your dinner for you, then, " said Max. "I've had none. And ifI'm to go rambling all over the town to look after you, I shall wantsomething to keep me going. "

"All right, " said Dudley. "I'm to come back here for you, then?"

And he took up his overcoat. Max began to help him on with it. 

"Come in here a moment, " said Dudley, in the same dry, abrupt manner asbefore; "I want to speak to you. "

Max followed him into the ante-room, and Dudley shut the sitting-roomdoor. 

"That girl, " said he, with, a frown--"where did you pick her up? At thewharf?"

"I met her there. She was walking about outside, afraid to go in. Theold woman had left her there alone, with a--a--dead body in the place. "

At these words a change came over Dudley's face. 

"You had better have left her alone, " said he, sharply. "I wonder youhadn't more sense than to take up with a girl like that. "

Max fired up indignantly. 

"Like what? There's nothing wrong with the girl--nothing whatever. Surely her behavior to-night showed you that. "

"Her behavior!" said Dudley, mockingly. "Do you mean her behavior to me, or to you?"

"Both. It was that of a modest, straightforward girl. "

"Very straightforward--to me. Very modest to you. But I would not wastetoo much time over her virtues if I were you. "

"I don't want to waste any, " replied Max, shortly. "I don't see how wecan shake her off, since she has offered to go back to the wharf withus. But I shall only be alone with her for the few minutes you leave ushere. Or, better still, I'll go with you, and wait while you see yourfriend. "

"What friend?"

"I thought you said you had an appointment with some one, and were goingto put him off. "

"Oh, yes. Well, let us go to him now. "

And Dudley softly opened the outer door. 

Max perceived that what he proposed was to give Carrie the slip. He drewback a step. 

"We can't go without telling her, at least _I_ can't. The girl'squite right. It would be safer for her to go with us. For it's an awfulplace, not fit to trust oneself in. "

"And you think it would be the safer for the presence with us of one ofthe gang?"

"She is not one of the gang!" cried Max, involuntarily raising hisvoice. "I'd stake my life on there being no harm in her!"

The door of the sitting-room was opened behind them, and Carrie cameout. 

"I couldn't help hearing what you said, " she said, quietly. "But youneedn't quarrel about me. One of you says there's no harm in me; theother says there is. I dare say you're both right. If you don't want meto go to the wharf with you, Mr. Horne, why, I won't go, of course. Goodevening. "

She wanted to go out, but Dudley stood in the way, preventing her. 

"You're quite wrong, I assure you, " said he, quickly. "There has been alittle discussion about it, certainly; but I think you and my friend arequite right, and it would be much better if you would go with us--muchbetter. Pray don't be annoyed at anything I've said. Remember, I havenever seen you before, while my friend, who knows you better, naturallyappreciates you more. "

Carrie maintained an attitude of cold stolidity while Dudley spoke. 

"Am I to go with you now, then?" she asked, coldly, when he had finishedspeaking. 

"Well, no, I think not. It will only take me ten minutes to go down intothe Strand and put off the fellow I was going to the theatre with. I'llcome back here, and we'll all go on together. "

Carrie looked at him steadfastly while he spoke, and he returned hergaze. For a few moments there was silence, and then it was broken by anexclamation from Max. He was staring first at one and then at the otherwith a face full of perplexity. 

"Do you know, " cried he at last, "that when you both look like that, andI turn from one to the other, it is as if I were looking all the time_at the same face_?"

Both Dudley and Carrie looked startled as they withdrew their eyes fromeach other's face. Then each sought the eyes of the other again as if itwere furtively. Dudley seemed, of the two, the more impressed by hisfriend's words. He laughed with some constraint. 

"Fanciful, very fanciful, " said he, mockingly. "What likeness can therebe between a girl with a white face, fair hair and blue eyes, " and hegave a glance at Carrie which had in it something of fear, "and a man ofmy type?"

Max looked at him, and then said slowly:

"It's not in the features, I know; it's not in the coloring; but it isthere, for all that. "

"The young lady will not feel flattered, " said Dudley, ironically. "Iwill leave you to make your peace with her, and when I come back, in tenminutes, I expect to find you both ready to start. "

He had his hand on the door, when some thought seemed to strike him, andhe hesitated and turned to put his hand on the shoulder of Max. Then heswung the young man round in such a way that his own back was turned toCarrie. Looking steadily and with a certain look of affectionate regardinto his friend's face, he formed with his lips and eyes a final warningagainst the girl. Then, with a nod, he went out, closing the door behindhim. 

CHAPTER XVIII. 

THE SWORD FALLS. 

When Max turned, he found that Carrie had retreated within the door ofthe sitting-room. He followed her into the room. 

"I hope he'll give us the full ten minutes, " said he, "for I had noluncheon to-day, and when I'm hungry I always get very cross. Is thatyour experience?"

Carrie looked at the table with a strange smile. 

"You ought to know, " said she. 

His face showed that he had not forgotten. 

"Those biscuits!" said he. "I remember. Does your granny treat youbetter now?"

Carrie's face grew gloomy and cold. And Max noticed that, thin as shehad been when he saw her last, she was much thinner now. The outline ofher cheek was pathetically pinched, almost sunken. 

"No. Worse, " she said at last, in a low voice. 

"You don't mean that she--_starves_ you?"

To his dismay, he saw the tears welling up in the girl's blue eyes, which looked preternaturally large in her wasted face. 

"Pretty nearly, " said she. 

Max stared at her for about the space of a second; then he went behindher, put his hands lightly on her shoulders and inducted her into thechair Dudley had placed for himself at the dinner-table. 

"It is evident, " said he, gravely, "that Providence has appointed mepurveyor of food to you, for this is the second time, within acomparatively short acquaintance, that I have had the honor of providingyou with a repast. This time it's quite in the manner of 'The ArabianNights, ' isn't it?"

It was indeed a fairy-tale banquet, this dinner of steak and chippotatoes, followed by _méringues à la crême_, and finishing up withbread and butter and cheese and celery. 

There was enough for two, the only drawback being a deficiency ofplates, which Max put right, in homely fashion, by eating his share fromthe dish. Such a tragedy it was to him to find a beautiful girl who washungry, actually hungry from want of food, that the appetite he hadtalked so much about failed him, and he found it difficult to eat hisshare and to keep up the light tone of talk which he judged to benecessary to the situation. 

He wanted to ask her a hundred questions about the people at the wharfand the awful thing which had happened there; but none of these subjectsseemed appropriate to the dinner-table, and Max decided to leave them toanother and a better opportunity. 

In the meanwhile he was getting more forgetful of Dudley's warning everymoment. Carrie seemed to guess his feelings, and to be grateful forthem. She said very little, but she listened and she laughed, and gavehim such pretty, touching glances, such half-mournful, half-merry lookswhen she thought he was not looking, that by the time they came to thecheese he was in a state of infatuation, in which he forgot to noticewhat a very long ten minutes Dudley was giving them. 

He thought, as he watched Carrie in the lamplight, that he had greatlyunderrated her attractions on the occasion of their first meeting. Shehad been so deadly white, so pinched about the cheeks; while now therewas a little trace of pink color under the skin; and her blue eyes werebright and sparkling with enjoyment. 

And it struck him with a pang that she looked so lovely, so bewitching, because of the change from cold and hunger which, as he knew, and as shehad acknowledged, were her usual portion. 

"Shall we sit by the fire?" asked he suddenly. 

And he jumped up from the table, and turned Dudley's biggest and coziestarm-chair round toward the warmth and the glow. 

Carrie hesitated. She rose slowly from her chair, and took up from theside-table, on which Max had placed it, the shabby black cape. 

"Oh, you needn't be in such a hurry, " said Max. "I dare say he'll be agreat deal more than the ten minutes he said he should take. "

It was her action which had recalled Dudley to his mind. And, for thefirst time, as he uttered these words, a doubt sprang up as to hisfriend's good faith. What if Dudley meant to give them both the slip, and to go off to the wharf by himself, after all?

Carrie's eyes met his; perhaps she guessed what was passing in his mind. 

"Oh, yes, he is sure to be longer than that, " said she at once; and, putting her cape down again, she took the chair Max had placed for her, while he sat in the opposite one. 

"It's beautiful to be warm!" cried she, softly, as she held out herhands to the blaze which Max had made. 

Then there was a long pause. Max had so much to say to her that hedidn't know where to begin. And in the meantime to sit near her and towatch the play of the firelight on her happy face was pleasant enough. But presently perceiving that she threw another uneasy glance in thedirection of her cape, he broke the silence hastily. 

"You said, " began he, abruptly, "that you were not going back to thewharf. Where were you going, then?"

"I don't know, " said Carrie, after a pause. 

Her face had clouded again. Her manner had changed a little also; it hadbecome colder, more reserved. 

"Do you mean that--really? Or do you only mean that you don't mean totell me, that I have no business to ask?"

"I mean just what I said--that I didn't know. "

"You are going to leave Mrs. Higgs and her friends, then?" asked Max, ina tone between doubt and hope. 

"Yes. "

She made this answer rather by a motion of the head than by her voice. 

"Well, I am very glad to hear it--very glad. "

"Are you? I'm not. Oh, it is dreadful, dreadful to lose one's home, anysort of home. "

"But could you call that a home? A hole like that? Among people likethis Mrs. Higgs and this Dick!"

"Oh, poor Dick! If they had all been like him it would not havemattered. "

"What! A pickpocket!" cried Max in disgust. 

"What difference did that make? Do you suppose the wives and daughtersof the men in the city, financiers and the rest, love them the lessbecause they pass their lives trying to get the better of other people?Isn't it just as dishonest to issue a false prospectus to get people toput their money into worthless companies as to steal a watch? It'snonsense to pretend it isn't. "

Carrie spoke sharply. She had grown warm in defense of her feloniousfriend. 

Max thought a little before he answered. 

"But you're not this man's wife or his daughter. "

"Well, no. But he wanted to marry me; and if he hadn't been caughtyesterday, perhaps I should have let him. "

"What?"

"Don't look so disgusted. He would have been kind to me. "

"And _do_ you think you couldn't find a better husband than a--thana pickpocket?"

"He would have been honest if I'd married him, " said Carrie, quietly. 

"He _says_ so, of course; but he wouldn't. A man says anything toget the girl he's fond of to promise to marry him. Do you think it'spossible to change the habits of years, of all a man's life, perhaps, like that?"

"I know it would have been possible, " persisted she, obstinately. "Iknow I could have worried him, and nagged at him, and worked for him, till I made him do what I wanted. "

And Max saw in her face, as she looked solemnly at the fire, thatdogged, steady resolution of the blue-eyed races. 

"Well, " said he crossly, "then I'm very glad he's been caught. "

"Ah!" cried she, quickly, "you don't know what it will lead to, though. He knows something, and if your friend, Mr. Horne, won't try to get himoff, why, he'll be sorry. "

Max looked worried and thoughtful at this threat. 

"I won't believe, " said he, stoutly, "that my friend had anything to dowith--with what happened at the place. It's monstrous!--impossible!"

Carrie said nothing. 

"Who would believe this pack of thieves against a man like DudleyHorne?"

Carrie laughed cynically. 

"Then why is he afraid?"

This indeed was the question which made the mystery inexplicable. Whatreason could Dudley have for wishing to hush up the matter unless hehimself had brought about Edward Jacobs's violent death This was theold, old difficulty in which any discussion of the subject or anymeditation on it always landed him. 

He got up from his chair and began to walk about the room. 

"Why are you leaving Mrs. Higgs?" asked he at last, suddenly. 

Max was not without hope that the answer might give him a clue tosomething more. 

"I couldn't bear it any longer. She has been different lately. She hasleft me alone for days together, and besides--besides--she has beenchanged, unkind, since Christmas. "

Now Max remembered that it was on Christmas Eve that he had met Mrs. Higgs in the barn at The Beeches; and he wondered whether that amiablelady had visited upon Carrie her displeasure on finding that he hadescaped alive from the wharf by the docks. 

"I believe, " said he, suddenly, "that it was your precious Mrs. Higgsthat murdered the man. I'm quite sure she's capable of it, or of anyother villainy. "

Carrie leaned forward and looked at him earnestly. 

"But what should he want to shelter Mrs. Higgs for, if _she_ haddone it?"

And to this Max could find no answer. 

"And why, if he had nothing to do with the murder, should he be so muchafraid of Mrs. Higgs that he steals away by himself to see her when shesends him a message?"

Max sprang up. 

"Steals away! By himself!" faltered he. 

"Why, yes. Did you really think he would come back? Didn't you know thatthe ten minutes he spoke of were only a blind, so that he could shakeyou off, and not make Mrs. Higgs angry by taking another man with him?Surely, surely, you guessed that! Surely, you knew that if the tenminutes had not been an excuse, he would have been back here long ago. "

Max felt the blood surging to his head. The girl was right, of course. He leaned against the bookcase, breathing heavily. 

"You knew! You guessed! Why didn't you--why didn't you tell me?"

Carrie stood up, as much excited as he was. Her blue eyes flashed, herlips trembled as she spoke. 

"What do I care--for him?" she said under her breath. "A man must takethe risk of the things he does, mustn't he? But you--you had donenothing; and--and you have been kind to me. I didn't want you to go. Icouldn't let you go. So I tried to keep you. I didn't want you toremember. And it was easy enough. "

Max felt a pang of keen self-reproach. Yes, it had been easy enough fora girl with a pretty face to make him forget his friend. He turnedquickly toward the door. But Carrie moved even more rapidly, and by thetime he reached it she was there before him. 

"It's too late now, " she said in that deep voice of hers, which, whenshe was herself moved, was capable of imparting her own emotion to herhearers. "He's been gone an hour. He'll be there by this time. What goodcould you do him by going? There's an understanding between her and him. He'll be all right. Now _you_ would not. "

Max stared at the girl in perplexity. She spoke with confidence, withknowledge. A great dread on his friend's account began to creep overhim. Why should Dudley be safe where he himself was not, unless he werein league with the old hag? Or, again, was it possible thatCarrie--pretty, sweet-faced Carrie--was acting in concert with the gang, detaining him so that Dudley might be an easier prey to her accomplices?

As this suspicion crossed his mind, he, knowing his own weakness, resolved to act without the hesitation which would be fatal to hispurpose. 

Seizing her by the arm, he drew her almost roughly out of the way, and, opening the door, went out into the ante-room. 

But before he could open the outer door, Carrie had overtaken him andseized him by the arm in her turn. 

"No, no, " said she, passionately. "I will not let you go. You don't knowwhat you are rushing into; you don't know what I do. "

"What do you mean?"

"That if you were to go into that house again, you wouldn't leave italive!"

"All the more reason, " said Max, struggling to free himself from thetenacious grasp of her fingers, which were a good deal stronger than hehad supposed, "why I should not let him go into such a place alone. "

"Well, if you go, you will take me, " said Carrie, almost fiercely. 

"Come along, then. "

He had his hand on the door, when he noticed that she had left her capein the room. 

"Fetch your cloak, " said he, shortly. 

She hesitated. 

"Give me your honor that you won't go without me. "

"All right. I'll wait for you. "

She disappeared into the sitting-room, leaving the door open, however. While she was gone, Max, still with his fingers on the handle of thedoor, heard the sound of footsteps coming up the stairs. It was notDudley's tread, and, the sound being a common one enough, Max did notpay particular attention to it, and he was surprised when Carriesuddenly thrust forth her head through the sitting-room doorway, with alook of excitement and terror on her face. 

"Listen!" said she, in a very low whisper. 

"Well, it's only some one going up the stairs, " said he, in a reassuringtone. 

Carrie shook her head emphatically. 

"Coming, not going, " said she. "And it's a policeman's tread. Don't youknow that?"

Max grew rather cold. 

"Oh, nonsense!" said he, quickly. "What should--"

She stopped him by a rapid gesture, and at the same moment there was aring at the bell. For a moment, Max, alarmed by the girl's words, hesitated to open it. Carrie made a rapid gesture to him to do so, atthe same time disappearing herself into the sitting-room. 

Max opened the door. 

A man in plain clothes stood outside, and at the head of the stairsbehind him was a policeman in uniform. 

"Mr. Dudley Horne?" said the man. 

"These are his rooms, but Mr. Horne is not here. "

"You are a friend of his, sir?"

"Yes. My name is Wedmore. "

If the man had had a momentary doubt about him, it was by this timedispelled. He stepped inside the door. 

"I must have a look round, if you please, sir. " Max held his ground. "Ihave a warrant for Mr. Horne's arrest. "

Max staggered back. And the man passed him and went in. 

CHAPTER XIX. 

A STRANGE PAIR. 

As Carrie, with her feminine acuteness, had guessed, Dudley Horne hadnever had any intention of returning to his chambers for her and Max. 

On the contrary, he was delighted to have the opportunity of slippingquietly away, and of evading the solicitude of his friend, as well asthe society of Carrie herself, of whom he had a strong but not unnaturalmistrust. 

No sooner did he reach the street than he hailed a hansom and directedthe driver to take him to Limehouse, and to lose no time. Then he satback in the cab, staring at the reins, while the haggard look on hisface grew more intense and the eager expression of expectancy and dreadof something impending became deeper every moment. 

During the last fortnight, Max, having had his thoughts occupied withhis own affairs, had not had so much time for the consideration of thoseof his friend; and he had lost sight altogether of the theory thatDudley was mad. But if he could have seen Dudley now, with the wild lookin his eyes, could have noted the restless movements of his hands, thetwitching of his face, the impatience with which he now leaned forward, now back, as if alternately urging the horse forward and holding himback, Max would have felt bound to admit that the case for the youngbarrister's insanity was very strong. 

As soon as the hansom began to thread the narrow streets which liebetween Commercial Road and the riverside, Dudley sprang out, paid theman his fare, and walked off at a rapid pace. It was a frosty night, andthe ill-clad women who shuffled past him looked pinched and miserable. Even they, with cares enough of their own on their shoulders, turned tolook at him as he passed. There was a glare in his black eyes, anuncanny something in his walk, in his look, which made them watch himand wonder who he was, and where he was going to. 

But by the time he had reached the riverside street to which his stepswere directed, even a chance passer-by was a rarity; and the gas-lampshad become so few and far between that no notice would have been takenof him if the traffic had been greater. 

His footsteps echoed in the silent street until he reached the woodendoor which was the entrance by night to Plumtree Wharf. 

The door was shut, and Dudley, apparently surprised by the circumstance, gave it an impatient shake. Then he heard a slight sound within whichtold him of the approach of some living creature, and the next momentthe door was opened a few inches, and the face of Mrs. Higgs appeared atthe aperture. 

She uttered a little mocking laugh when she saw who her visitor was andlet him in without any other comment. 

Dudley strode in, with a frown of displeasure on his face, and waitedunder the piles of timber while Mrs. Higgs relocked the door. There wasa lamp just outside the wooden boarding which shut the wharf in, and bythe light of it Dudley got a good look at the old woman's face beforeshe rejoined him; and it seemed to him that the placid expression sheusually wore had given place to a look more sinister, more repellent. She passed him, still without a word, but with a nod which he took foran invitation to him to follow her. They passed through the littlewash-house into the inner room, and Mrs. Higgs seated herself by thefire, and gave her visitor another nod to imply that he might be seatedalso. 

But Dudley was not in a friendly mood. He would not even come near thehearth, but remained close to the door by which he had entered, and gavesearching look round the room. 

The apartment was so small and so bare that it was not difficult to takestock of its contents, and Mrs. Higgs laughed ironically. 

"Isn't the place furnished to your liking?" she asked in a mocking tone. "Are you looking for the sofas and the sideboards and the silver and theplate?"

Dudley cast at the old woman a look which was more eloquent than he knewof hatred and disgust. 

"No, " said he, shortly. "I was looking to see whether any of yourprecious pals were about. "

Mrs. Higgs drew her chair nearer to the deal table, and leaning on itwith her head resting in her hands, stared at him malignantly. 

"My precious pals! My precious pals!" muttered she to herself in anangry tone. "That's the way he talks to me! To me, he owes so much to!Ah! Ah! Ah!"

These three last ejaculations were uttered with so much suppressedpassion, and there gleamed in her dull eyes such a dull look of stupidferocity, that Dudley withdrew his attention from the cupboard and wallsand transferred it wholly to her. After a pause, during which the twoseemed to measure each other with cautious eyes, he said, abruptly:

"Do you know why I have come here to-night?"

"To show me a little gratitude at last, perhaps, " suggested Mrs. Higgs, sharply. "To do your duty--yes, it's no more than your duty, you know, to do what I tell you--and to help yourself in helping me. That's true, isn't it?"

Dudley stared at her in silence for a few moments before he answered:

"Duty is an odd word to use--a very odd word. But we won't waste timediscussing that. You sent a message to me by a girl this evening?"

Mrs. Higgs nodded. 

"You want me to defend one of the rascals who make this place theirhole, their den?"

Again Mrs. Higgs signified assent. 

"Well, I shall do nothing of the kind. I have done more than enough foryou already. I have offered you the means of taking yourself off and ofliving like a decent creature. I have done everything you could expect, and more. But I will not be mixed up with you and the gang you choose tomake your friends; and I will not lift a finger to save your friend thepickpocket from the punishment he deserves. "

Dudley spoke with decision, but he made no impression worth speaking ofupon his hearer. She continued to look at him with the same expressionof dull malignity; and when she spoke, it was without vehemence. 

"Well, " she began, leaning forward a little more and keeping her eyesfixed upon him, "perhaps you won't have the chance of defending anybodylong. There's been a woman about here lately, making inquiries andhunting about, and one of these fine days she may light upon somethingthat'll put her upon your track. "

"What do you mean? Whom do you mean?"

"Why, Edward Jacobs's widow, of course. She had an idea where to look, you see. "

Dudley could not hide the fact that he was much disturbed by thisintelligence. 

"Poor woman! Poor woman! Who can blame her?" said he at last, more tohimself than to Mrs. Higgs, "I've done what I could for her, sent hermoney every week since--"

To his amazement, Mrs. Higgs suddenly interrupted him, bringing her fistdown upon the table with a sounding thump. 

"You fool!" screamed she. "You--fool! You've given yourself away! Youdeserve all you'll certainly get! Do you suppose a Jewess wouldn't havewits enough to trace you by that? By the fact that you sent her money?"

"But I sent it anonymously, " said Dudley. 

"That doesn't matter. Money? Postal-orders, I suppose?"

"Yes. "

"Well, they can be traced. Oh, you fool, you wooden-headed fool!"

There was a pause. Mrs. Higgs appeared to have exhausted herself invituperation, while Dudley considered this new aspect of the affair insilence. 

"Well, " said he at last, "if she does trace me, who will be thesufferer, do you suppose--you or I?"

"Why, you, you, you, of course!" retorted the old woman with heat. "Youwill be hanged, while I can bury myself like a mole in the ground and beforgotten, lost sight of altogether. "

She said this with unctuous satisfaction, and Dudley gave her a glanceof horror. 

"And what particular pleasure will it give you, even supposing such anoutcome possible, to see me hanged?"

The old woman's indecent delight faded gradually from her face as shelooked at him. Then she rose slowly from her chair and came a stepnearer to Dudley, who instinctively recoiled from the threatened touch. She noticed this movement, and resented it fiercely. 

"Why do you go back? Why do you want to get away? Always to get away?"she asked, angrily. "That's what makes me so mad! Why do you try to getout of the business in the way you do? Sneaking out of it, as if it hadnothing to do with you? Why don't you throw in your lot with me and goaway with me, as I wished you to, as you once were ready to do?"

Dudley looked searchingly into the wrinkled face. 

"I was never ready to go, " said he. "I did affect to be ready. I wasready to go as far as Liverpool with you, to get you safely out of thecountry, out of danger to me and to yourself. But I should never havegone farther than that. I never meant to. I would run any risk ratherthan that. "

Mr. Higgs never blinked. Staring steadily up into his face, with amalignity more pronounced than ever, she asked, in a mocking tone:

"Why? Why?"

Dudley was silent. 

Mrs. Higgs laughed, and shook her head with a look of unspeakablecunning. 

"You needn't answer, " said she, dryly, "for I know the reason. You won'tleave England because of a girl. "

Dudley did not start, but the quiver which passed over his featuresbetrayed him. 

"Ha, ha!" laughed Mrs. Higgs. "It's not much use telling me a fib when Iwant to know anything. You wouldn't own up, so I went ferreting on myown account, and I found out what I wanted. You're in love with a girlnamed Wedmore--Doreen Wedmore--and it's on her account that you won'tleave England, and throw in your lot with me, like a man!"

Dudley's face had grown gray with fear. When he spoke it was in achanged tone. He had lost his confidence, his defiant robustness. Healmost seemed to be begging for mercy, as he answered:

"I don't deny it. I don't deny anything. I did care for a girl; I donow. But I have given her up. I was bound to, with this ghastly businesshanging to my heels. I shall never see her again. "

Mrs. Higgs cut in with decision:

"No, that you won't. I'll answer for it!"

Dudley looked at her, but did not dare to speak. There was something inthe spiteful tones of her voice, when she mentioned Doreen, which filledhim with vague dread. It was in a subdued and conciliatory voice that hepresently tried to turn the conversation to another subject. 

"Who was the girl you sent this evening, the girl who brought yourmessage?"

"Nobody of any consequence, " answered Mrs. Higgs, as if the subject wasnot to her taste. "A girl who lives here. We call her Carrie. "

"And her other name?"

His tone betrayed his suspicions. Mrs. Higgs shrugged her shoulders. 

"What does that matter to you? She is your half-sister, but I don'tsuppose you wish to claim relationship?"

"Does she know--anything?"

"Something, perhaps. Not too much, I think. But it doesn't matter. Sheis a weak, namby-pamby creature, and I'm sick of the sight of her whiteface. So I've got rid of her. "

"How?"

"I've given her notice to quit. I don't expect her back again. "

"And aren't you afraid that she may give information?"

"Ah! Your solicitude is for yourself, eh? No, she'll hold her tongue forher own sake. " And Mrs. Higgs's features relaxed into a menacing grin. "She's seen enough of me to know she must be careful!"

Dudley moved restlessly. 

"Isn't it rough on the girl to bring her up like this? In this hole, among these human vermin? She seems to have some decent instincts. "

Mrs. Higgs frowned. 

"She was brought up as well as she had any right to expect, " said she, shortly; "educated fairly well into the bargain. She has not had much tocomplain of. "

Dudley made no answer to this for some minutes, and during this timeMrs. Higgs kept him steadily under observation, not a movement of hishands, a change of his expression, escaping her. At last he looked ather, and seemed to be struck by something in her face. He put hisfingers upon the handle of the door as he turned to go. 

"Well, " said he--his voice sounded hollow, cold--"I have said what Icame to say. I need not stay here any longer. I don't wish to meet anyof your friends. "

Mrs. Higgs got slowly to her feet. 

"My friends!" cried she, angrily. "My friends! They've done you no harm, at any rate; while your friends come spying round the place, pokingtheir noses into business which is none of theirs. "

Dudley's hand dropped to his side. 

"Do you mean Max Wedmore?" said he, earnestly. "Why, he is the son ofthe man who has been a father to me, who brought me up, who saved mefrom becoming the outcast that poor girl is--"

Mrs. Higgs interrupted him fiercely. 

"That'll do. I'm sick of the very name of Wedmore. They've had their owninterests to serve, whatever they've done, depend upon it. And if hecomes fooling round here again, I'll treat him as you--"

Dudley broke in sharply, stopping her as her voice was growing loud andher gestures threatening. After a short pause, during which she watchedhim as keenly as ever, he asked, in a hoarse whisper:

"What did you do with--_him_? Did anybody help you--any of yourfriends here? Or did you--"

Mrs. Higgs cut him short with an ugly laugh. At the mention of the deadman her face had changed, and a strange gleam of mingled cunning andferocity came into her small, light eyes. 

"Come and see--come and see, " mumbled she, as she took up thecandlestick from the table and shuffled across the room to the doorwhich opened into the disused shop. 

Dudley hesitated a moment; indeed, he glanced at the door by which hestood as if he felt inclined to make his escape without further delay. But Mrs. Higgs, slow as she seemed, turned quickly enough to divine hispurpose. 

"No, " said she, sharply, "not that way. This!"

Seizing him by the arm, she thrust a key into the lock of the door withher other hand, and half led, half pushed him into the dark front room. 

Dudley was seized with a nervous tremor when he found himself inside theroom. By the light of the candle the woman held, he could see at aglance into every corner of the bare, squalid apartment--could see thestains on the dirty walls, the cracks and defects in the dilapidatedceiling, even the thick clusters of cobwebs that hung in the corners. Having taken in all these details in a very rapid survey, he looked downat the floor, at the very center of the bare, grimy boards, with a fixedstare of horror which the old woman, by passing the candle rapidlybackward and forward before his eyes, tried vainly to divert. 

Even she, however, seemed to be impressed by the hideous memory the roomcalled up in her, for she spoke, not in her usual gruffly indifferenttones, but in a husky whisper. 

"Tst--tst!" she began, testily. "Haven't you got over that yet? One Jewthe less in the world! What is it to trouble about? Be a man--come, be aman! See, this is how I got rid of him. "

As she spoke, Mrs. Higgs suddenly dropped Dudley's arm, which she hadbeen clutching tenaciously, and hobbling away from him at an unusualrate of speed for her, she went back to the door, turned the key in thelock, and then withdrew it and dropped it into her pocket. This actionDudley was too much absorbed to notice. 

Then she made her way at her usual pace, leaning heavily on the stoutstick she was never without, toward the corner where the heap of lumberlay, on the left-hand side of what had once been the fireplace. Here shestooped, lifted a couple of bricks and a broken box-lid from the floor, and then easily raised the board on which they had stood, and beckonedto Dudley to come nearer. He did so, slowly, and with evidentreluctance. 

"Look here, " said she, pointing down to the space where the board hadbeen. "Look down. Don't be afraid, " she added, in a jeering tone. "There's nothing there to frighten you. See for yourself. "

Dudley stooped, and looking through the small opening available, sawthat there was a space hollowed out underneath. 

"And you put him there--under the boards?" said Dudley, in a low voice. "But it was in the water that the body was found--in the river outside. "

"Why, yes, so it was, " said the old woman, slowly, as she lifted theboard out of its place altogether, and displacing also the one next toit, descended through the opening she had made. 

Dudley watched her with fascinated eyes. Apparently the space below wasnot very deep, for she had only disappeared as far as the kneesdown-ward, and then knelt down, and for a moment was lost to sightaltogether. She appeared to be struggling with something, and Dudley, consumed with horror, took a step back as he watched. 

Presently she looked up. Her face was in shadow, but he could see thatshe was panting, as if with some great exertion. 

"Get back! Stand in the middle of the room there, if you're afraid, "said she, mockingly. "Right out of my reach, mind, where I can't get atyou. "

Instinctively Dudley obeyed, stepping back into the little patch oflight thrown by the candle. 

He had scarcely reached the middle of the room when he felt the boardsunder his feet give way. Staggering, he tried to retrace his steps, toreach the end of the room where the old woman, now again on a level withhim, was watching him in silence. 

But as he moved towards her she made a spring at him, and forcing himback with so much suddenness that he, quite unprepared, was unable toresist her attack, she flung him to the ground in the very middle of theroom. 

As he fell he felt the flooring give way under him. The next moment hewas struggling, like a rat in a well, in deep water. 

CHAPTER XX. 

THE PREY OF THE RIVER. 

"Help! Help!" shouted Dudley. "Do you want to drown me?"

Great as the shock was of finding himself flung suddenly into what hesupposed was a flooded cellar, Dudley did not at first believe that theold woman had any worse intention than that of playing him an ugly andmalicious trick. 

But as he uttered this question he looked up, and saw her face half adozen feet above him, wearing an expression of fiendish malignity whichfroze his blood. 

She was holding the candle so that she might see his face, and as hekept himself afloat in the small space available--for he had no room tostrike out, and no foothold on the slimy earthen sides--he began tounderstand that she was in grim, deadly earnest, and that the placewhere the dead body of Edward Jacobs had been concealed was to be hisown grave. 

Then he did not cry out. He saw that he would only be wasting hisbreath; that there was no mercy in the hard-light eyes, in the lines ofthe wicked, wrinkled mouth. 

He made a struggle to climb up one side of the pit in which he foundhimself; but the soft earth, slimy with damp, slipped and gave way underhim. He tore out a hole with his fingers, then another, and anotherabove that. And all the while she watched him without a word, apparentlywithout a movement. 

But just as he came to a point in his ascent from which he might hope tomake a spring for the top, she raised her thick stick and dealt him ablow on the head which sent him, with a splash and a gurgling cry, backinto the water. 

He saw strange lights dancing before his eyes. He heard weird noisesthundering in his ears, and above them all a chuckling laugh, like themerriment of a demon, as the boards of the displaced flooring were drawnslowly up by a cord from above until they closed over his head, shuttinghim down. 

 * * * * *

When the police made their descent upon Dudley's chambers, Max, aftergiving his name and address, was allowed to go away without hindrance. 

He wanted Carrie to go with him, but as she persistently held down herhead and refused to look at him, he came to the conclusion that she hadher own reasons for wishing him to go away without her. 

So he went slowly down into the Strand, wondering whether he dared to goto the wharf to try to warn Dudley, or whether he would be drawing downdanger upon his friend's head by doing so. For although he could notascertain that he was himself shadowed, he thought that it might verypossibly be the case. 

He had reached the corner of Arundel Street, when he found that Carriewas beside him. She was panting, out of breath. 

"Hello!" said he. 

"I've been such a round!" said she. "Just to see whether they werefollowing me. But they weren't. I guessed you'd come this way, and Iwent down by the embankment and up to try to meet you. Are they afteryou?"

"I don't think so. Dare we--"

"Wharf? Yes, I think we may. By the way, I'll show you. "

She took him across Waterloo Bridge, where they took a cab and traversedsouthward to a point at which she directed the driver to stop. 

On the way, Max, from his corner of the hansom, watched the girlfurtively. For a long time there was absolute silence between them. Thenhe came close to her suddenly, and peered into her face. 

"Carrie, " said he, "I want you to marry me. "

Now Max had been some time making up his mind to put thisproposition--some minutes, that is to say. He had been turning thematter over in his brain, and had imagined the blushing, tremblingastonishment with which the lonely girl would receive his mostunexpected proposal. 

But the astonishment was on his side, not on hers; for Carrie onlyturned her head a little, scarcely looking at him and staring out againin front of her immediately, remarked in the coolest manner in theworld:

"Marry you! Oh, yes, certainly. Why not?"

Max was taken aback, and Carrie, at last stealing a glance at him, perceived this. She gave a pretty little kindly laugh, which made himexpect that she would say something more tender, more encouraging. 

But she didn't. 

Turning her head away again, she went on quietly laughing to herself, until Max, not unnaturally irritated by this acceptance of his offer, threw himself back in his corner and tried to laugh also. 

"It's a very good joke, isn't it--an offer of marriage?" said he atlast, in an offended tone. 

"Very, " assented Carrie at once. "About the best I ever heard. "

And she went on laughing. 

"And I suppose, " went on Max, unable to hide his annoyance, "that if Iwere to tell you it was not a joke at all, but that I spoke in downrightearnest, you would laugh still more?"

"Well, I think I should. "

"Well, laugh away, then. I was in earnest. I meant what I said. I wasidiot enough to suppose you might find marrying me a better alternativethan wandering about without any home. Extraordinary, wasn't it?"

"Well, " answered Carrie, subduing her mirth a little and speaking inthat deep-toned voice she unconsciously used when she was moved--thevoice which Max found in itself so moving--"I should say it wasextraordinary, if I didn't know you. "

"If you didn't know me for an idiot, I suppose you mean, " said Max, coldly, with much irritation. 

"Not quite that, " replied she, in the same tone as before. "I meant if Ihadn't known you to be one of those good-natured people who speak beforethey think. "

Max sat up angrily. 

"I have not spoken without thinking, " said he, quickly. "I have donenothing but think of you ever since I first saw you; and my asking youto marry me is the outcome of my thinking. "

"Well, if I were you, I should think to better purpose than that. "

Her tone was rather puzzling to Max. There was mockery in it; but therewas something more. He came to the conclusion, after a moment'sconsideration of it, and of the little that he could see of her face, that she felt more than she chose to show. So he put his arm around herand caught one of her hands. 

"Look here, Carrie, " said he in a whisper. "I understand you. I know howyou feel. I know you think it's neither decent nor wise to ask a girl tobe your wife when you've only seen her twice. But just consider thecircumstances. If I don't get you to say what I want you to say now, Ishall lose sight of you to-night and never see you again. Now, Icouldn't bear that--I couldn't, Carrie. I never saw a girl like you; Inever met one who made me feel as you make me feel. And you like me, too. You wouldn't have troubled yourself about my going to the wharf ifyou hadn't cared. It's no use denying that you like me. "

Carrie turned upon him with energy. 

"Well, I don't deny it, if you care to hear that, " said she, quickly. "Ido like you. How could I help it? I liked you the moment I first sawyou; I shouldn't have spoken to you if I hadn't; I should have beenafraid. But what difference does that make? Do you think I'm a fool? Doyou think I don't know that this feeling you have--and I believe in it, mind--is just because I'm a new sensation to you, who are a spoiledchild--nothing more nor less. Oh, don't let's talk about it; it'ssilly. "

She had wrenched herself impatiently away from him, and now sat upright, frowning and looking straight in front of her as before. 

Max, not finally rebuffed, but rather puzzled what to make of this formof repulse, was silent for a few moments. 

"Well, if you won't let me talk about that, " he said at last, "will youpromise to let me know where you are going to, so that I shan't have tolose sight of you? Come, you like me well enough to agree to that, don'tyou?"

Carrie hesitated. 

"I told you, " she said at last, in a low voice, "that I didn't knowmyself where I was going. Have you forgotten that?"

"But it wasn't true. You said it to put me off. You must know!"

"Well, I shan't tell you. There!"

"Why?"

"Because it would be the beginning of what I don't want and won't have. Because you'd come and see me, and I shouldn't have the heart to say youmustn't come; and in the end, if you persisted, I shouldn't have theheart to stop you from making a fool of yourself. "

"How, making a fool of myself?"

"Why, by marrying me. Now don't pretend you don't know it's true. Marrying me would be just ruin--ruin! Oh, I know! What would your familysay, and be right in saying? That you'd been got hold of by a girlnobody knew anything about, without any parents or friends, and who camefrom nobody knew where. "

"Ah, but when they knew you--"

"They'd think less of me than they did before. "

"Nonsense! When they saw how beautiful you are and well educated andrefined, they wouldn't believe you came from such a place as Limehouse. "

Carrie smiled. 

"I seem refined to you, because you didn't expect much where you foundme. Put me beside your sisters and their friends, and I should be shyand awkward enough. No, I will not listen, and I want you to tell thedriver to stop here. "

Whether this was the point she had proposed to reach or whether shewanted to cut short the subject, Max could not tell. But as the hansomstopped she sprang out and led the way hurriedly in the direction of theriver. She knew her way about on this side of the river as well as onthe other, for she went straight to the water's edge, got into a boatwhich was moored there with a dozen others, and, with a nod to a manwith a pipe in his mouth who was loafing near the spot, she directed Maxto jump in, and seized one oar while he took the other. 

"If we go from this side, " she said, "we can make sure we're notfollowed, at all events. "

In the darkness they began to row across the river, where the traffichad practically ceased for the night. 

Threading their way between the barges, the great steam traders, withtheir ugly square hulks standing high out of the water, and the lessercraft that clustered about the larger like a swarm of bees round thehive, they came out upon the gray stream, slowly leaving behind one dimshore, with its gloomy wharves and warehouses, and nearing the other. The London lights looked dim and blurred through the mist. 

As they drew near the wharf, Carrie jerked her head in the direction ofthe little ugly cluster of buildings which Max remembered so well. 

"There's a passage under there, " she said in a whisper, leaning forwardon her oar, "through which they let the dead body of the man--youknow--out into the river. It's just near here. "

Max shuddered, and at the same moment there burst from the girl's lips ahoarse cry. 

Max turned sharply, and saw that she was staring down into the water. 

"Look! Look there!" whispered she, gasping, trembling. 

"What is it?" cried he. 

But even as he asked, he knew that the dark object he saw floating inthe water was the body of a man. 

By a dexterous movement of her oar, Carrie had brought the boatalongside the black mass, and then, with the boat-hook, which she usedwith an evidently practiced hand, she drew the body close. 

Max, sick with horror, leaned over just as Carrie's exertion's broughtthe face of the man to view. 

"He's dead!" cried he, hoarsely. "It's another murder by those vilewretches in there!"

An exclamation burst from the girl's lips. 

"Look at him! Look at his face! Who is he?" whispered she, withtrembling lips. 

Max looked, putting his hand under the head and lifting it out of thewater. 

Then, with a great shout, he tore at the body, clutching it, trying todrag it into the boat. 

"Great Heaven! It's Dudley!"

CHAPTER XXI. 

A DUBIOUS REFUGE. 

The night was clammy and cold. The fog was growing thicker, blacker. Andthe water of the Thames, as Max plunged his hand into it, struggling toraise the body of his friend, was ice-cold to the touch. 

Carrie had seized her oar again, and was bringing the boat's headrapidly round, right under the stern of a barge which was moored closeto Plumtree Wharf. 

"Hold him; don't let him go!" cried she imperiously. "But don't try todrag him into the boat until I get her alongside. You can't do itwithout help. And if you could you'd pull the boat over. "

The caution was necessary. Max had lost his head, and was making franticefforts to raise the body of his friend over the boat's side. 

"But he may be alive still! And if there's a chance--oh, if there's theleast chance--"

"There'll be none if you don't do as I tell you!" cried Carrie, tartly. 

By this time a lad on board the barge was looking over the side at them, not seeing much, however, in the gloom. Carrie whistled twice. 

"Hello!" replied he, evidently recognizing a signal he was used to. 

"Is that Bob?"

"Yes. "

"Lower a rope, and hold on like a man, Bob. We've got a man here drownedor half-drowned; and we want to get him on the wharf in a twinkling. "

"Right you are. "

The next moment the lad had lowered a rope over the side of the barge, and Carrie directed Max to pass it round the body of his friend. Then, she giving the orders as before, Bob from the barge above and Max fromthe boat below raised the body out of the water. Carrie had brought thelittle boat close to the barge, and held it in place with the boat-hookuntil the difficult task was safely accomplished, and the body of DudleyHorne laid upon the deck of the barge. 

"Now, " said she to Max, "get up and help Bob to carry him ashore. "

Max, who was speechless with grief and as helpless as a child in thesenew and strange circumstances, obeyed her docilely, and climbed to thedeck of the barge. 

"Now, Bob, " went on Carrie, as she seized the second oar and prepared torow away, "carry him into the kitchen--you know your way--as fast as youcan. And lay him down before the fire, if there is a fire; if not, makeone. Sharp's the word, mind!"

"All right, missus. "

Max looked down. Already she had disappeared in the gloom, and only themuffled sound of the oars as they dripped on the water told him that shehad not yet gone far away. 

Suddenly he felt a rough pull at his arm. 

"Come on, mister!" cried Bob, briskly. "She said, 'Sharp is the word. 'And when she says a thing she means it, you bet your life. "

Max pulled himself together and turned quickly, ashamed of his own lackof vigor in the face of Carrie's intelligence and energy. Bob and heraised the body of Dudley and carried it across the plank to the wharf, where Bob, who knew his way about there, led the way to the door whichMax remembered so well. 

It was open, and they passed through the outhouse, meeting no one, tothe kitchen, which was also deserted. There they laid Dudley on thehearth, as Carrie had directed, and Bob proceeded to rake up the fire, which had died down to a few embers. 

Meanwhile Max had taken off some of Dudley's clothes, and began to applyfriction with his hands to the inanimate body. He had scarcely begun, when Carrie came in with an armful of dry towels and a couple ofpillows. 

"He is dead, quite dead!" cried Max, hoarsely. 

Carrie never even looked at him. Placing herself at once on her kneesbehind Dudley's head, she curtly directed Max to raise the upper part ofhis body, and slipped the two pillows, one on the top of the other, under the shoulders of the unconscious man. 

"Now, " said she, "go on with your rubbing--rub with all your might; andyou, Bob, bring in a couple of big stone-bottles you'll find in thewash-house, fill them with hot water from the boiler, wrap them up insomething, and put one to his feet and the other to the side that's awayfrom the fire. "

While she spoke she was working hard in the endeavor to restorerespiration, alternately drawing Dudley's arms up above his head andlaying them against his sides, with firm and steady movements. 

For a long time all their efforts seemed to be useless. Max, indeed, hadlittle or no hope from the first. He still worked on, however, perseveringly, but with despair in his heart, until he heard a sharpsound, like a deep sigh, from Carrie's lips. 

She had detected a movement, the slightest in the world, but still amovement, in the senseless body. With straining eyes she now watched, that her own movements might coincide with the natural ones which Dudleyhad begun to make, and that real breathing might gradually take theplace of the artificial. 

"Let me do it. Let me help you, " cried Max, who saw the strained look ofutter fatigue which Carrie wore in spite of her excitement. 

"No, no; I dare not. I must go on!" cried the girl, without lifting hereyes. 

And presently another cry escaped her lips, a cry of joy. 

"He is alive!"

"Thank God!"

The tears sprang to the eyes of Max. It was more than he had hoped. 

"A doctor! Shall I fetch a doctor?" said he. 

Carrie shook her head. 

"A doctor could do no more than we've done, " said she. "He'll be allright now--well enough to be got away, at all events. And the wound onhis head isn't much, I think. "

"Wound on his head!"

"Yes. It saved his life, most likely. Prevented his getting so muchwater into his lungs. Stunned him, you see. "

Something like a sigh from the patient stopped her and directed theattention of them all to him. Bob, who had been standing in thebackground, almost as much excited as the others, came a few stepsnearer. There was a moment of intense, eager expectancy, and then Dudleyhalf opened his eyes. 

Max uttered a deep sob and glanced at Carrie. She was deadly pale, andthe tears were standing in her eyes. 

"You've saved him!" said Max, hoarsely. 

The sound of his voice seemed to rouse Dudley, who looked at him with avacant stare, and then let his eyelids drop again. 

"So glad, old chap--so glad to--to see you yourself again!" whisperedMax, huskily. 

But Dudley was not himself. He looked up again, then tried to smile, andat last turned his head abruptly and seemed to be listening. 

Carrie beckoned to Max and spoke low in his ear. 

"You'd better take him away from here as quickly as you can, for half adozen reasons. "

Max nodded, but looked doubtful. 

"He's ill, " said he. "How shall I get him away? And where shall I takehim to?"

"Down to your father's house" answered she at once. 

Max looked rather startled. 

"But--you know--the police!" muttered he, almost inaudibly. "Won't thatbe the very first place they'd come to--my home?"

"Never mind that. You must risk it. He's going to be ill, I think, andhe can't be left here. Surely you know that. "

She gave a glance round which made Max shiver. 

"And how am I to get him all that way to-night? The last train has gonehours ago. "

"Take him by road, then. We'll get a carriage--a conveyance of some sortor other--at once. I'll send Bob. "

She turned to the lad and gave him some directions, in obedience towhich he disappeared. Then she turned fiercely to Max. 

"Don't you see, " said she, "that if he wakes up and finds himself here, after what's happened, it'll about settle him?"

The words sent a shudder through Max. 

"After what's happened!" repeated he, with stammering tongue. "What wasit? Who did it?"

But, instead of answering, Carrie threw herself down beside Dudley, whowas now rapidly recovering strength, although he hardly seemed tounderstand where he was or by whom he was being tended. 

"Do you feel all right now?" she asked, cheerfully. 

He looked at her with dull eyes. 

"Oh, yes, " said he. "But I--I don't remember what--"

"Take a drink of this, " interrupted Carrie, quickly, as she put to hislips a flask of brandy which Bob had fetched. "You've got to take a longdrive, and you want something to warm you first. "

"A drive! A long drive!"

Dudley repeated the words as if he hardly understood their meaning. Buthe was not satisfied, and as he sipped the brandy he looked at hercuriously. His next words, however, were a criticism on the restorative. 

"What vile stuff!"

"Never mind. It's better than nothing. Try a little more. "

But instead of obeying, he looked her steadily in the face. 

"Where did I see you? I remember your face!" said he. "And who was thatI heard talking just now?"

Suddenly, without any warning, he disengaged one hand from the hottowels in which he was swathed and sat up. A hoarse cry broke from hislips as full recognition of the place in which he found himself forceditself upon him. With a wild light of terror in his eyes, he lookedsearchingly round him. 

"Where is he? Where is he?" cried he, in a thick whisper. 

Carrie's face grew dark. 

"Here is your friend, " she cried cheerily, "here is Mr. Wedmore. He'sgoing with you; he's not going to leave you; be sure of that. "

"Yes, old chap, I'm going with you, " said Max, hurrying forward andtrying to shut out the view of the room with his person as he knelt downby his friend. 

Dudley frowned impatiently. 

"You, Max!" said he. "What are you doing here?"

But he asked the question without interest, evidently absorbed inanother subject. 

"I'm going to take you down to The Beeches, " answered Max, promptly. 

To his infinite satisfaction, this reply had the effect of distractingDudley's thoughts. Into his pallid face there came a tinge of color, ashe looked intently into his friend's eyes, and repeated:

"The Beeches! You don't mean that!"

"I do; the carriage will be here in a minute or two. And in the meantimewe must think upon getting you dressed. "

This question of clothing promised to be a difficult one, as Dudley'sown things were saturated with water. Carrie sprang to her feet. 

"I'll see about that, " said she, briskly, as she disappeared from theroom. 

Max, alarmed at being left alone with Dudley, in whose eyes he could seethe dawn of struggling recollection, babbled on about Christmas, hismother, his sisters, anything he could think of till Carrie came backagain, with her arms full of men's clothes--a motley assortment. 

Max looked at them doubtfully. They were all new--suspiciously new. 

Carrie laughed, with a little blush. 

"Better not ask any questions about them, " said she. "Take your choice, and be quick. "

With his lips Max formed the word: "Stolen?" but Carrie declined toanswer. As there was no help for it, Max dressed his friend in such ofthe clothes as were a passable fit for him, while Carrie went out towatch for the expected carriage. When she returned to the kitchen, Dudley was ready for the journey. He was lying back in a chair, lookingvery white and haggard and exhausted, casting about him glances full ofexpectancy and terror, and starting at every sound. 

But he asked no more questions, and he made no mention of Mrs. Higgs. 

Bob had fulfilled his errand well. Outside the wharf they found acomfortable landau, with two good horses, hired from the nearestlivery-stable. 

CHAPTER XXII. 

TWO WOMEN. 

Bob grinned with satisfaction when Max, expressing his gratification, dropped into his hand a half-sovereign. 

"Thought you'd be pleased, sir, " said he, as he helped to get Dudleyinto the carriage. "I said it was for a toff, a reg'lar tip-topper; andso it was, s' help me!"

Dudley, who was very lame, and who had to be more than half carried, looked out of the window. 

Max was still outside, trying to get hold of Carrie, who was on theother side of the carriage. 

"You're coming, Max?"

"Yes, oh, yes, rather. "

"And--you?"

Dudley turned to Carrie, who drew back quickly and shook her head. 

"I? No. "

Max ran round at the back of the carriage and caught her by the arm asshe was slinking quietly away. 

"Where are you going? Not back in there? You must come with us. "

"I!--come with you? To your father's house? Catch me!"

"Well, part of the way, at any rate, " urged Max, astutely. "I dare notgo all that way with him alone. See, he wants you to go. You shall getout just when you please. "

Carrie hesitated. Although she saw through the kindly ruse which wouldprotect her against her will, she saw, also, that Dudley was indeed inno fit state to take the long journey which was before him, and atlength she allowed herself to be persuaded to accompany them on at leastthe first part of the journey. 

And so, in the fog and the gloom of a January night, they began theirstrange drive. 

The road they took was by way of Greenwich and Dartford to Chatham, where there would be no difficulty in getting fresh horses for the restof the journey. 

Dudley, who had been made as comfortable as possible by a sort of bedwhich was made up for him in the roomy carriage, seemed, after a shortperiod of restlessness and excitability, to sink into sleep. 

Max was rejoicing in this, but Carrie looked anxious. 

"It isn't natural, healthy sleep, I'm afraid, " said she, in a low voice. "It's more like stupor. It wasn't the water that did it, it was a blowon the head. You saw the mark. I'm afraid it's concussion of the brain. "

"Ought he to travel, then?" asked Max, anxiously. 

Carrie, who was sitting beside Dudley, and opposite to Max, hesitated alittle before answering:

"What else could we do? We couldn't leave him there at the wharf, couldwe? And where else could we have taken him? Not back to his chambers, certainly!"

There was silence. The carriage jogged on in the darkness throughLondon's ugly outskirts, and the two watchers listened solicitously tothe heavy breathing of their patient. It was a comfort to Max, a greatone indeed, to have Carrie for a companion on this doleful journey. Butshe was not the same girl, now that she had duties to attend to, thatshe had been over that _tête-à-tête_ dinner, or even during thejourney in the hansom. He himself felt that he now counted for nothingwith her, that he was merely the individual who happened to occupy theopposite seat; that her interest, her attentions, were absorbed by theunconscious man by her side. 

"Why didn't you become a hospital nurse?" asked Max, suddenly. 

He heard rather than saw that she started. 

"That's just what I thought of doing, " she answered, after a littlepause. "I'm just old enough to enter one of the Children's Hospitals asa probationer. They take them at twenty. "

"I see. Then you couldn't have tried before. "

"No; they're very strict about age. "

"I should think you were cut out for the work, if only you are strongenough, " said Max, with warmth. "You seem to do just the right thing injust the right way. "

"I've had plenty of experience, " said Carrie, shortly, breaking in uponrhapsodies which threatened to become tender. "I did a lot of visitingamong poor people who had no one to nurse them when I lived with MissAldridge. Down in these parts, the East End, you get practice enoughlike that, I can tell you!"

"But the treatment of a drowning man--that requires special knowledge, surely!"

"Yes, but down by the river is just the place to get it. He's the fifthperson I've seen taken out for dead in the time I've lived there. Threeout of the five were dead. The other two, a boy and a woman, werebrought around. "

There was silence again. 

Presently Max whispered:

"Do you know--can you guess--how he got into the water?"

Carrie shivered. 

"Wait--wait till he can tell us himself, " said she, hurriedly. "It's nouse guessing. Perhaps it was an accident, you know. "

"You don't think so?"

"Sh--sh!" said Carrie. 

But Max persisted. 

"You know as well as I do that that villainous old Mrs. Higgs is at thebottom of the affair. "

Carrie bent over Dudley, to assure herself that, if not asleep, he wasat least unconscious of what was passing. Then she turned to Max. 

"You are wrong, " said she then, quickly. "Mrs. Higgs was an agent only, in the hands of some one else. If I tell you what I believe, you willonly laugh at me. "

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that she was a harmless, good-hearted, kind woman until--untilMr. Horne came to see her; that she was always good to me till then. Andthat, after that awful day when the man was killed--murdered by Mr. Horne--"

"It's not true! It can't be true!" burst out Max. 

But Carrie went on, as if he had not spoken:

"After that day she changed; she was irritable, unkind, neglectful--notlike the same woman. She left me alone sometimes; she gave me no food atothers; she hid herself away from me; she was angry at the least thing. And then--then, " went on the girl, in a frightful whisper, "I found outsomething. "

"What was it?"

"That some one used to get into the place at night--I don't know how;some one she was afraid of--a man. "

"Well?" said Max, excited by her tone. 

"I have heard him--seen him twice, " went on Carrie, in the lowest ofwhispers. "And I believe--"

"Yes, yes; go on!"

"That it was Mr. Dudley Horne. "

"Oh, rubbish!"

Carrie was silent. Max went on, indignantly:

"How could you take such a silly idea into your head? What reason shouldMr. Horne have for creeping about a hole like that at night?"

"Well, what reason should he have for coming to it at any time? Yet youknow he came in the daytime. "

It was the turn of Max to remain silent. There was a long pause, andthen Carrie went on:

"I used to sleep in a little attic over the outhouse, just a corner ofthe roof it was. And twice at night I have heard a noise underneath, andlooked through the cracks in the boards and seen a man down there, witha light. And each time, when the light was put out and the noise hadstopped, I have gone downstairs and found the doors bolted still on theinside. "

"Well, the place seems to be honeycombed with ways in and ways out. Thestrange man either went out by some way even you knew nothing about, orelse Mrs. Higgs let him out. "

"No, she didn't. I should have heard or seen her. "

"Well, but what reason can you have for supposing that this man was Mr. Dudley Horne?"

"Once I saw his face, " answered Carrie. 

"And you think it was the face of this man here beside you?"

Max struck a light and held it over the face of the unconscious Dudley. Carrie looked at him steadily. 

"Well, " she said at last, "it did look like him, that's all I can say. "

Max frowned uneasily. But after a few moments a new thought struck him, and he turned to her sharply. The match he had struck had burned itselfout, and they were again in darkness. 

"If Mrs. Higgs was only a tool in his hands, as you suggest, for somemysterious purposes which nobody can understand or guess at, how do youaccount for her trying to drown him?"

"They must have quarreled, " said Carrie, quickly. Then, instantlyperceiving that she had made an admission, she added: "That is, supposing she had anything to do with it. "

"Amiable old lady!" exclaimed Max. 

The mystery of the whole affair hung over both him and Carrie like apall; and the long night-drive seemed never-ending in the death-likesilence. Max tried from time to time to break it, but Carrie grew morereserved as the hours went by, until her curt answers ceased altogether. 

Then, when dawn came, the dull dawn of a foggy morning, and the carriagedrew up at the hotel in Chatham where they were to change horses, Maxdiscovered that she was asleep. 

Dudley opened his eyes when the carriage stopped, but shut them againwithout a word to Max, who asked him how he felt. 

Max, when the people of the hotel had been roused, succeeded inborrowing a rug, which he wrapped gently round Carrie, without wakingher. And presently the carriage jogged on again on its journey, and themorning sun began to pierce the mist as the bare Kentish hop-fields andorchards were reached. 

Max leaned forward and looked at Carrie's sweet face with infinitetenderness. Now in her sleep she looked like a child, with her lipsslightly parted and her eyelashes sweeping her thin, white cheeks. Thealert look of the Londoner, which gave an expression of prematureshrewdness to her waking face, had disappeared under the relaxinginfluence of slumber. She looked pitifully helpless, sad and weak, asher tired, worn-out little body leaned back in the corner of thecarriage. 

Max looked at her with yearning in his eyes. This young ne'er-do-weel, as his father called him, had enjoyed the privilege of his type in beinga great favorite with women. As usual in such cases, he had repaid theirkindness with ingratitude, and had had numerous flirtations without everexperiencing a feeling either deep or lasting. 

Now, for the first time, in this beautiful waif of the big city he hadfound a mixture of warmth and coldness, of straightforward simplicityand boldness, which opened his eyes as to there being in her sex anattraction he had previously denied. He felt as he looked at her that hewanted her; that he could not go away and forget her in the presence ofthe next pretty face he happened to see. 

This shabbily dressed girl, with the shiny seams in her black frock andthe rusty hat, inspired him with respect, with something like reverence. 

In his way he had been in love many, many times. Now for the first timehe worshiped a woman. 

When the carriage stopped at the park gate of The Beeches, Max sprangout, and without waiting to answer the hurried questions of Carrie, whohad awakened with a start, he ran across the grass and up the slope tothe house. 

It was nine o'clock, and, when the door was opened by Bartram, Max cameface to face with Doreen, who was entering the hall on her way to thebreakfast-room. 

"Why, Max, is it you? What a strange time to arrive! And where have youbeen? You look as if you'd been up all night!" cried she, and she ranforward to kiss him, and swinging him round to the light, examined him, with an expression of amazement and horror. 

"I have been up all night, " said he, briefly. "I've driven all the wayfrom London--"

"What!"

"And--and I've brought some one with me--some one who is ill, who is introuble. Some one--"

A cry broke from her lips. She had grown quite white, and her hands haddropped to her sides. 

She understood. 

"Dudley!" she whispered. "Where is he? Why haven't you brought him in?"

"He is at the gate. Where is my father? I must speak to him first, or tomother. "

Mrs. Wedmore herself, having been informed by Bartram of the arrival ofher son, now came out of the breakfast-room to meet him. In a few wordshe informed her of the circumstances, adding, as he was bound to do, that there was a possibility that the police might come to makeinquiries, if not to arrest Dudley. But Doreen, who insisted on hearingeverything, overruled the faint objection which Mrs. Wedmore made, anddetermined to have him brought in before her father could learn anythingabout it. 

Max, therefore, went down to bring the carriage up to the door, andDudley, having been roused into a half-conscious condition, was assistedinto the house and up to one of the spare bedrooms--Max on one side andBartram on the other. 

By this time Mr. Wedmore had, of course, become aware of what was goingon; but it was now too late to interfere, even if he had wished to doso. When Dudley had been taken upstairs, Doreen met her brother as hecame down. 

"Who is the girl with the sweet face inside the carriage?"

Max stammered a little, and then said, by a happy inspiration:

"Oh, that's the nurse. You see--he was so ill--"

Doreen looked at him keenly, but did not wait for anymore explanations. 

"Why doesn't she come in, then? Of course she must come in. "

And she ran out to the door of the carriage, with Max not far behind. 

"Aren't you coming in? They've taken your patient upstairs, " she saidgently, as poor Carrie, who looked more dead than alive, sat up in thecarriage and tried to put her hat and her cape straight. 

"Oh, I shan't be wanted now, shall I?" asked Carrie, with a timid voiceand manner which contrasted strongly with her calm, easy assurance whileshe was at work. 

Max threw a glance of gratitude at his sister, as he quickly opened thedoor of the carriage and more than half dragged Carrie out. 

As the girl stepped, blinking, into the broad sunlight, Doreen stared ather intently, and then glanced inquiringly at her brother, who, however, did not see her questioning look. He led Carrie into the house andstraight up the stairs toward the room where they had put Dudley. 

"Don't make me stay, " pleaded she, in a low voice. "They will know I'mnot a regular nurse, and--and I shall be uncomfortable, miserable. Youcan do without me now. "

She was trying to shrink away. Max stopped in the middle of the stairs, and answered her gravely, earnestly:

"I only ask you to stay until we can get a regular nurse down. He is tooill to do without a trained attendant; you know that. Will you promiseto wait while we send for one?"

Carrie could scarcely refuse. 

"Yes, I will stay till then, if I am really wanted, " assented she. 

"Ask my sister. Here she comes, " said Max. 

Doreen was on the stairs behind them. 

"Is it really necessary--do you want me to stay while a nurse is sentfor?" asked Carrie, diffidently. 

Doreen looked up straight in her face. 

"What more natural than that you should stay with him?" returned she, promptly; "since you are his sister. "

Max and Carrie both started. The likeness between Dudley and Carrie, which Max had taken time to discover, had struck Doreen at once. Carriewould have denied the allegation, but Max caught her arm and stoppedher. 

"Quite true, " said he quietly. "This is the way, Miss Horne, to yourbrother's room. "

Doreen was quick enough to see that there was some little mystery aboutthe relationship which she had divined, and she went rapidly past herbrother without asking any questions. 

It was about two hours after Dudley's arrival that Carrie, now installedin the sick-room, came to the door and asked for Max. Her face was rigidwith a great terror. She seemed at first unable to utter the words whichwere on her tongue. At last she said, in a voice which sounded hard andunlike her own:

"Don't send for a nurse. I must stay with him. He is delirious, and Ihave just learned--from him--from his ravings, a secret--a terriblesecret--one that must not be known!"

CHAPTER XXIII. 

THE BLUE-EYED NURSE. 

It was at the door of Dudley's sick-room that Carrie informed Max thatshe had learned a secret from the lips of the sick man, and Max, by anatural impulse of curiosity, nay, more, a deep interest, pushed thedoor gently open. 

Dudley's voice could be heard muttering below his breath words which Maxcould not catch. 

But Carrie pulled the young man sharply back by the arm into thecorridor, and shut the door behind her. Her face was full ofdetermination. 

"No, " said she, "not even you. "

Max drew himself up, offended. 

"I should think you might trust me, " he said, stiffly. "The doctor willhave to hear when he comes. And the secret, whatever it is, will besafer with me than with old Haselden. "

Carrie smiled a little, and shook her head. 

"The doctor, " said she, "wouldn't be able to make head or tail of whathe says. Now, you would. "

"And if I did, what of that? Don't I know everything, or almosteverything, already? Didn't I bring him down here, to my father's house, after I knew that there was a warrant out against him? What better proofdo you want that the secret would be safe with me?"

But Carrie would not give way. Without entering into an argument, shestood before him with a set look of obstinacy in her mouth and eyes, slowly shaking her head once or twice as he went on with hispersuasions. 

"Do you think I should make a wrong use of the secret?" asked Max, impatiently. 

"Oh, no. "

"Do you think it would turn me against him?"

But at this question she hesitated. 

"I don't know, " said she, at last. 

"It is something that has given you pain?" Max went on, noting thetraces of tears on her face and the misery in her eyes. 

"Yes, oh, yes. "

The answer was given in a very low voice, with such a heart-felt sobthat Max was touched to the quick. He came quite close to her, and, bending down, so that his mustache almost brushed the soft fair hair onher forehead, he whispered:

"I'm so sorry. Poor Carrie! I won't worry you, then; I won't ask anymore questions, if only--if only you'll let me tell you how awfullysorry I am. "

He ventured to put his hand upon her shoulder, as he bent down to lookinto her face. 

And, as luck would have it, Mr. Wedmore at that very moment bounced outof one of the rooms which opened on the corridor, and caught sight ofthis pretty little picture before it broke up. 

Of course, Max withdrew his hand and lifted up his head so swiftly thathe flattered himself he had been too quick for his father, who walkedalong the corridor toward the drawing-room as if he had seen nothing. 

But Max was mistaken. Mr. Wedmore, already greatly irritated by hisson's repeated failures to settle down, found in this little incident apretext for a fresh outburst of wrath. 

Unluckily for poor Carrie, Mrs. Wedmore was in a state of irritation, inwhich she was even readier than usual to agree with her husband. Thearrival of Dudley, with a terrible charge hanging over his head, in suchcircumstances as to stir up Doreen's feelings for him to the utmost, wasbad enough. But for him to descend upon them in the company of a youngwoman of whom she had never heard, and in whose alleged relationship toDudley she entirely disbelieved, had reduced the poor lady to a statewhich Queenie succinctly described as "one of mamma's worst. "

As soon as Mr. Wedmore entered the drawing-room, where his wife anddaughters were discussing some invitations to dinner which were to havebeen sent out, but about which there was now a doubt, he abruptlyordered the two girls to leave the room. They obeyed very quietly, butDoreen threw at her mother one imploring glance, and gently pulling herfather's hair, told him that he was not to be a hard, heartless man. 

When the door was shut, however, Mr. Wedmore addressed his wife in novery gentle tones. 

"Ellen, " said he, curtly, "you must get rid of that baggage they callthe nurse. She's no more a nurse than you are!"

"And she's no more his sister than I am, either!" chimed in Mrs. Wedmore, who had risen from her chair in great excitement. 

Mr. Wedmore stared at his wife. 

"Sister!" cried he, in a voice of thunder. "Whose sister? Dudley Hornenever had a sister!"

"I know that, but that's the story they have made up for us; and thegirls--our girls--are ready to believe it, and I don't want them to knowit isn't true. "

"Well, whatever she is, and whoever she is, I want her to be outside thehouse before lunch time, " said Mr. Wedmore. "I've just caught Max withhis arm around her, and I haven't the slightest doubt that it was he whomade up the story. Any tale's good enough for the old people! Look ather face--look at her dress! She is some hussy who ought never to havebeen allowed inside the house!"

"It was Doreen who brought her in. And, to do her justice, George, Ibelieve the girl didn't want to come, " said Mrs. Wedmore. "And it'sabout Doreen I wanted to talk to you, George. This coming of Dudley hasupset all the good we did by never mentioning him to her. To-day she'sas much excited, as anxious and as miserable as if they were stillengaged. And--and--oh! if the police come here to the house and take himawa-a-ay, "--and here the poor lady became almost too hysterical toarticulate--"it will break the child's heart, George; it will indeed. And, oh! do you think it possible he really did--really did--"

"Did what?"

"Oh, you know! It's to dreadful to say. Why do you make me say it? Theysay something about his having gone out of his mind, and--and--killedsomebody. It isn't true, George, is it?"

"I don't know, I'm sure. Who told you?"

"Max first, and then I learned the rest from the guesses of the girls. Oh, it is dreadful--shocking! And to think of his having been planteddown upon us like this, just when I was beginning to hope that Doreenwas getting kinder to Mr. Lindsay. "

"It's all the doing of that idiot Max!" said Mr. Wedmore, angrily. "I'llsend him out to the Cape, and make an end of it. He shall go nextmonth. "

"Oh, I didn't want that, " pleaded Mrs. Wedmore, with a sudden change totenderness and self-reproach. "Don't do anything in a hurry, George, anything you will be sorry for afterward. "

"Sorry for! The only thing I'm sorry for is that I didn't send himbefore, and saved all this. "

"And as for the girl, no doubt it's her fault, and Dudley's, a greatdeal more than Max's, " went on the mother of Max, with the usualfeminine excuse for the darling scapegrace. "When she's gone he willforget all about her, as he always does. "

This speech was an unlucky one. 

"Yes, that's just what I complain of, that he always forgets, " said he, turning sharply upon his wife. "If he would stick to anything or toanybody for so much as a week, or a day, or an hour, I shouldn't mind somuch. But he isn't man enough for that. As soon as this girl's out ofthe house, he'll be looking about for another one. "

"I'm sure it wasn't his fault that she came here at all, " persisted Mrs. Wedmore, who never opposed her husband except in the interest of herson. "And I'm sure you can't blame him for doing what he could for hisfriend, even if he does put us to a little inconvenience. After all, Dudley's been like a son to you for a great many years--"

"That's just what I complain of--that he's so like a son, " interruptedher husband. "That is to say, he has brought upon us no end of worry andbother, and a bill for five guineas for this pleasant little drive downfrom London. "

"Well, how could we refuse to take him in?"

"How did he get into the mess?"

"What mess?"

"That's what I want to know, too--what mess? I am told he fell into thewater, striking his head against the side of a bridge, or of a church, or it doesn't matter what, as he fell. They haven't thought it worthwhile to make up a good story. But whether he was drunk, or whether hewas escaping from the police, or what he was doing, nobody seems toknow. If I'd been consulted, if I hadn't been treated as a cipher in thematter, he should have driven straight back to London again with thegirl, and with Max himself. "

Mrs. Wedmore thought it better to say nothing to this, but to let herhusband simmer down. These ferocious utterances came from the lips only, as she very well knew, and might safely be disregarded. 

Fortunately his attention was diverted at this point by the arrival ofthe doctor, who had been out on his rounds when they first sent for him. 

Rather relieved to have a fresh person to pour out his complaints to, Mr. Wedmore hastened to give his old friend a somewhat confused accountof the patient's arrival and condition, in which "cheap, ready-madeclothes, " "a bill for five guineas, " "a baggage of a girl" and "thepolice" were the prominent items. 

But as for any details concerning the patient's state of health and thereasons for his needing medical care, Doctor Haselden could learnnothing at all until he had prevailed upon Mr. Wedmore to let him seeDudley instead of listening to abuse of him. 

Doctor Haselden was a long time in the sick-room, and when he came outhe looked grave. Mr. Wedmore, who met him outside the door, was annoyed. 

"It's nothing, I suppose, that a few days' quiet won't set right?" heasked quickly. 

"I don't know, I'm sure, " answered the doctor. "It's more serious than Ithought by what you said--a great deal more serious. I don't know, I'msure, whether we shall get him round at all. "

A little cry startled both men and made them look round. In a recess ofthe corridor above they could distinguish the figure of a woman, and Mr. Wedmore's heart smote him, for it was Doreen. 

"Go away, child! Go away!" said he, half petulantly, but yet with someremorse in his tone. "The girl's crazy about him, " he added, withirritation, when his daughter had silently obeyed. 

"Poor child! Poor child!" said Doctor Haselden, sympathetically. "She'sthe real old-fashioned sort, with a warm heart under all her littleairs. I hope he'll get round, if only for her sake. But--"

"She couldn't marry him in any case, " said Mr. Wedmore, shortly. "Ithought I told you that affair was broken off--definitely brokenoff--weeks ago. And now--"

He stopped and intimated by a gesture of the hand that the break wasmore definite than ever. 

The doctor was curious, but he tried not to show it. 

"I should wire up to town for another nurse, I think, " said he. "Thislittle girl can't do it all. "

Mr. Wedmore pricked up his ears. 

"Then I must wire for two--for two nurses, " said he, decidedly. "We'regoing to send this girl off. She's not a nurse at all. "

"Ah, but she does very well, " objected the doctor, promptly, "and youwill be doing very unwisely if you send her away. It seems sheunderstands all the circumstances of the case, and that counts forsomething in treating a patient who has evidently something on his mind. She seems to be able to soothe him, and in a case of concussion--"

"But she's trying to get hold of my fool of a son Max!" protested Mr. Wedmore. 

"But it isn't a question of your son Max, but of young Horne, " saidDoctor Haselden, with decision. "As for Max, he can take care ofhimself; and, at any rate, he's got all his family about to take care ofhim. You keep the girl. She's got a head on her shoulders. Most uncommonthing, that--in a girl with such eyes!"

And the doctor, with a humorous nod to his angry friend, wentdownstairs. 

After this warning of the real danger in which Dudley lay, it was, ofcourse, impossible for Mr. Wedmore to send poor Carrie away, at any rateuntil the arrival of some one who could take her place. And as there wasclearly some sense in the doctor's suggestion that her knowledge of thecase was valuable, Mr. Wedmore ended by sending up for one trained nurseto relieve her, instead of for two, as he had proposed. 

And, after all, there seemed to be less danger in the direction of Maxthan he had supposed; for Carrie never once left the sick-room until theprofessional nurse arrived at ten o'clock that night. And as Mrs. Wedmore was then in waiting to mount guard over Carrie, and to carry heroff to her supper and then to her bedroom, the first day's danger to thesusceptible son and heir seemed to have been got through rather well. 

On the following morning, however, the well-watched Carrie escaped fromthe supervision of her jailers, and boldly made a direct attack upon Maxunder the family's nose. 

Carrie was looking out of one of the back windows of the house to get abreath of fresh air, before taking her turn of duty in the sick-room, when she saw Max talking to one of the grooms outside the stables. Hesaw her, and his face flushed. Mrs. Wedmore, who was standing on guard afew paces from Carrie, noted the fact with maternal anxiety. She ratherliked the girl, whose modest manners were as attractive as her prettyface; but with the fear of "entanglements" before her eyes, she tried tocheck her own inclination. Carrie turned to her abruptly. 

"The nurse won't mind waiting a few minutes for me, " said she, quickly. "I must speak a few words to Mr. Max. "

And before Mrs. Wedmore could get breath after this audacious statement, Carrie was down the stairs and half away across the yard, where Maxhastened to meet her. 

"I have something to say to you, " she began at once with a grave face. "Do you know that--_they've come_?"

"Who? Who have come?"

"The police. "

Max started. 

"Nonsense! What makes you think so? I've seen no one. "

"I have, though. I've been expecting them, for one thing, and it's mademe sharp, I suppose. But I've seen in the park, among the trees, thismorning before anybody was up almost, a man walking about, taking hisbearings and looking about him. "

"One of the gardeners, " said Max. "There are several. "

"Oh, no, it wasn't a gardener. Can't you trust my London eyes? Andlisten: Presently another one came up, and they talked together. Thenone went one way and the other another, not like gardeners orworkingmen, but like men on the lookout. "

"What should they be on the lookout for?" asked Max. "If they wantDudley, why don't they come up to the house? I don't doubt that by thistime they know where he is. "

Carrie said nothing; but there was in her eyes, as she glancedsearchingly round her, a peculiar look of wistful dread which puzzledMax and made him wonder what fear it was that was in her mind. 

CHAPTER XXIV. 

MAX MAKES A STAND AND A DISCOVERY. 

There was a pause, and then Carrie, without answering him, turned to goback into the house. But Max followed and caught her by the arm. 

"Carrie, " said he, "they're making a slave of you, without a word ofthanks. You look worn out. "

"No, I'm not, " said she, briskly. "I've only taken my turns; I shouldlook all right if it hadn't been for that long, tiring journeyyesterday. I haven't quite got over that yet. "

She was trying to free her hand, which Max was holding in his. 

"You'll never be strong enough for a hospital nurse, Carrie!"

"Oh, yes, but I shall!" retorted she. And as she spoke, the pink color, the absence of which made her usually look so delicate, came into hercheeks. "And you must remember that I shall be better fed, betterclothed then. I am not really weak at all. "

"I repeat--you will never be strong enough for a nurse. Better take myadvice and marry me, Carrie!"

But at that, a sudden impulse of hot anger gave the girl the necessarystrength to snatch her hand away from him. She faced him fiercely. 

"What! To be looked at always as your father, your mother, look at menow? As if I were a thief who must be watched, lest she should stealsomething? They needn't be afraid either, if only they knew! And beforeI go I'll tell them. Yes, I'll tell them what a mistake they make inthinking I want to take their son, their precious son, away from them!That for their son!"

And Carrie, very ungratefully, to be sure, held her right hand close tothe face of Max and snapped her fingers scornfully. She had seen Mrs. Wedmore's eyes over the half blind of one of the windows, and the minxthought this little scene would be a wholesome lesson. 

But Max, following the direction of Carrie's eyes, had also seen thewatching face, and a manful spirit of defiance on the one hand, ofpassion on the other, moved him to show both Carrie and his mother howthings were going with him. 

Seizing the girl round the waist when her little spurt of defiance wasscarcely over, he held her head with his disengaged hand and pressedupon her eyes, her cheeks and her lips a dozen hot kisses. 

"There!" said he, when at last he let her go, and she, staggering, blushing, ran toward the shelter of the house. "That's what you get forbeing ungrateful, you little cat. And it's nothing to what you'll getfrom my mother, who's sure to say it's all your fault. And so--" roaredhe up the stairs after her, as she reached the top, "so it is, ofcourse!"

But Carrie found a refuge inside the sick-room, where Dudley, who hadpassed a better night than they had even hoped, was now lying withclosed eyes, quiet and apparently calm. 

It was upon Max himself, for a wonder, that the vials of the familywrath were poured. Mrs. Wedmore, happening to meet her husband while thelast grievance against the girl was fresh, and before she had had thetime to meditate on the result of a premature disclosure, made known tohim the outrage of which she had been a witness, taking care to dwellupon the audacity of the girl in pursuing and provoking Max. 

Mr. Wedmore listened in silence, and then said, curtly:

"Where is he now? Send him to me. "

Max, bent upon making himself as conspicuous and, therefore, asoffensive as possible, was whistling in the hall at the moment. Andthere was a defiant note in his very whistling which worked his fatherup to boiling point. Mr. Wedmore sprang off his chair and dashed openthe door. 

"Max, you fool, come here!" was his unpromising summons. 

Max came at once, rather red in the face and bright of eyes. Mrs. Wedmore, standing, frightened and anxious, in the background, thoughtshe had never seen her darling boy look so handsome, so manly. He camein very quietly, without swaggering, without defiance, as if he had notnoticed the offensive epithet. 

His father, who was by this time on the post of vantage, the hearth-rug, with his hands behind him and his back to the fire, pointed imperiouslyto a chair. 

"Sit down, sir. "

Max sat down very deliberately on a chair other than the one his fatherhad chosen for him, and looked down on the floor. 

"So you are at your old tricks, your old habits!" began Mr. Wedmore. 

Max looked up. Then he sat up. 

"What old tricks and habits do you mean, sir?"

"Running after every girl you see, and in defiance of all decency, underyour mother's very nose. "

Mrs. Wedmore would have interposed here, but her husband waved his handimperially, and she remained silent. Max leaned back in his chair andmet his father's eyes steadily. 

"You have made a mistake, sir, and my mother has made a mistake, too. Itis quite true she may have seen me kissing Miss--Miss--Carrie, in fact. But I hope to have the right to kiss her. I want to marry her. "

"To marry this--this--"

"This beautiful young girl, whom nobody has a word to say against, "interrupted Max, in a louder voice. "Come, sir, you can't say I'm at myold tricks _now_. I've never wanted to marry any girl before. "

For the moment Mr. Wedmore was stupefied. This was worse, far worse thanhe had expected. Mrs. Wedmore, also, was rather shocked. But thesensation, was tempered, in her case, with admiration of her boy'sspirit in daring to make this avowal. 

"Mind, I only say I _want_ to marry her. Because, so far, she hasrefused to have anything to say to me. "

"Not refused to marry you!" broke in Mrs. Wedmore, unable to remainquiet under such provocation as this. 

"Yes, refused to marry me, mother. I have asked her--begged her. "

"Oh, it's only artfulness, to make you more persistent, " cried Mrs. Wedmore, indignantly. 

"Or perhaps, " suggested Mr. Wedmore, in his driest tones, "the girl isshrewd enough to know that I should cut off a son who was guilty of sucha piece of idiocy and leave him to his own resources. "

Max said nothing for a moment; then he remarked, quietly:

"You have been threatening to do that already, sir, before there was anyquestion of my marrying. "

Mrs. Wedmore was frightened by the tone Max was using. He was so muchquieter than usual, so much more decided in his tone, that she began tothink there was less chance than usual of his coming to an agreementwith his father. 

"You know, Max, " she said, coming over to his chair and putting anaffectionate hand on his head, "that your father has only spoken to youas he has done because he wanted to rouse up your spirit and make youashamed of being lazy. "

Max rose from his chair and turned to her with flashing eyes. 

"And now, when there is a chance of my rousing myself at last, when I amready and anxious to prove it, and to set to work, and to settle down, he is angrier with me than ever. Mother, you know I'm right, and youknow it isn't fair. "

Mrs. Wedmore looked with something like terror into her son's handsome, excited face. 

"But, my dear boy, don't you see that this would be ruin, to tieyourself to a girl like that? Why, she told me herself that she didn'tbelong to anywhere or anybody. "

"And is that any reason why she should never belong to anywhere or toanybody? If there was anything wrong about the girl herself, I wouldlisten to you--"

"Listen to us! You'll have to listen!" interrupted his father. 

Max glanced at him, and went on:

"But there is not. "

"And how do you know that? How long have you known her?"

Max was taken aback. It had not occurred to him to think how short hisacquaintance with Carrie had been. 

"Long enough to find out all about her, " he answered, soberly; "and tomake up my mind that I'll have her for my wife. "

"Then that settles it, " broke in Mr. Wedmore, whose ill-humor had notbeen decreased by the fact that Max evidently considered it moreimportant to conciliate his mother than to try to convince him. "Youwill go to the Cape next month; and if you choose to take this baggagewith you, you can do so. It won't much matter to us what sort of a wifeyou introduce to your neighbors out there. "

But Max strode across the room and stood face to face with his father, eye to eye. 

"No, sir, " he said, in a dogged tone of voice, thrusting his hands deepinto his pockets and looking at him steadily. "I shall not go to theCape. You have a right to turn me out of your house if you please. Infact, it's quite time I went, I know. It's time I did settle down. It'stime I did try to do something for myself. And I'm going to. I'm goingto try to earn my own living and to make enough to keep a wife--the wifeI want. And I shall do it somehow. But I'm not going to be packed off toAfrica, as if my marrying this girl were a thing to be ashamed of. I'mgoing to stay in England. I sha'n't come near you. You needn't be afraidof that. I shall be too proud of my wife to bring her among people whowould look down upon her. And perhaps you'd better not inquire where Ilive or what I'm doing, for we sha'n't be able to live in a fashionableneighborhood, nor to be too particular about what we turn our hands to. "

While Max made this speech very slowly, very deliberately, his fatherlistened to him with ever-increasing anger and disgust, and his mother, not daring to come too close while he was right under the paternal eye, hung over the table in the background, with yearning, tremulous love inher eyes, and with her lips parted, ready to utter the tender words of apleading peacemaker. 

But the tone Mr. Wedmore chose to take was that of utter contempt, complete irresponsibility. When his son had finished speaking he waitedas if to hear whether there was any more to come, and then abruptlyturned his back upon him and began to poke the fire. 

"Very well, " said he, with an affectation of extreme calmness. "Sinceyou have made up your mind, the sooner you begin to carry out your plansthe better. I'm very glad to see that you have a mind to make up. "

"Thank you, sir, " said Max. 

And he was turning to leave the room, when his mother sprang forward andstopped him. 

"No, no! Don't go like that! My boy! George! Don't say good-bye yet. Take a little time. Let him try a little trouble of his own for achange. He has made up his mind, he says. I'm sure he's old enough. Leave him alone. "

Max put his arm round his mother, gave her a warm kiss, disengagedhimself, and left the room. 

The poor woman was almost hysterical. 

"He means it, George! He means it this time!" she moaned. 

And her husband, though he laughed at her, and though he said to himselfthat he did not care, was inclined to agree with her. 

Max went straight up to his own room, and began to do his packing withmuch outward cheerfulness. Indeed he felt no depression over the dashingstep he was taking, although he felt sore over the parting with home andhis mother and sisters. 

He was debating within himself whether he should try to see Carriebefore he went, or whether he should only leave a note to be given toher after he was gone, when he heard the voice of his sister Doreencalling him. He threw open the door and shouted back. 

She was in the hall. 

"Max, " cried she, in a hissing whisper, "I want to speak to you. Makehaste!"

He ran downstairs and found her standing with two of the maids, both ofwhom looked rather frightened. 

"Max, " said Doreen, "there's an old woman hanging about the place--" Maxstarted. He guessed what was coming. "The same old woman that came atChristmas time. She jumped up in the well-house at Anne, and sent herinto hysterics. And now they've lost sight of her, just as they did lasttime, and we want you to help to ferret her out and send her away. "

"All right, " said Max. "We'll pack her off. "

He was at the bottom of the staircase by this time, and was starting onhis way to the yard, when a little scream from one of the two maids, asshe glanced up the stairs, made him look around. Carrie had come down solightly and so swiftly that she was upon the group before they had hearda sound. She beckoned to Max, who came back at once. 

Carrie was shaking like a leaf; her eyes were wide with alarm, withterror. Max went up a few stairs, to be out of hearing of the others, asshe seemed to wish. Then she whispered:

"You know who it is. I saw her. Leave her alone. I implore you to leaveher alone! She'll do no harm. Let her rest. Let the poor creature rest. If--if the police--"

At that moment there was a shout from the yard outside. Carrie spranglike a hare up the stairs to the window, and looked out with strainingeyes. 

The afternoon was one of those dull misty winter days, with a leaden skyand an east wind. 

"I'll see that she isn't hurt!" called out Max, as he bounded down thestairs and ran into the yard behind the house. 

Here he found a motley group--the stablemen, the laundry-maids and thegardeners--all hunting in the many corners and crannies of theoutbuildings for the old woman who had alarmed Anne. 

Max spoke sharply to the men. 

"Here, what are you about?" said he. "Hunting a poor old woman as if shewere a wild animal? Go back to your work. She'll never dare to show herface while you are all about!"

"She's left the well-house, sir, and, we think, she's got into the bigbarn, " explained one of the lads, with the feeling that Mr. Max himselfwould want to join in the chase when he knew that the game was to hand. 

"Well, leave her there, " answered Max, promptly. "She'll come out whenyou've all gone, and I'll send her about her business. "

Max saw, as he spoke, that there was a man standing at a little distancejust outside the stable-gate, whom he did not recognize. Before he couldask who he was, however, the man had disappeared from view. Heremembered what Carrie had said about the presence of a policeman, andhe thought the time was come to take the bull by the horns. 

So he walked rapidly in the direction of the gate, and addressed the manwhom he found there. 

"Are you a policeman?" he asked, abruptly. 

"Yes, sir, " answered the man, touching his hat. 

"What is your business here?"

"I'm on the lookout for some one I have a warrant for. Charge of murder, sir. "

"Man or woman?"

"Man, sir. "

"Will you tell me his name?"

"Horne, sir. "

Max thought a moment. 

"Why are you pottering about here, instead of going straight up to thehouse?"

"Well, sir, I'm obeying orders. "

"Come with me, " said Max suddenly. "There's an old hag hiding in thebarn now, who knows more about this business than Mr. Horne. "

Behind the young gentleman's back the detective smiled, but he professedto be ready to follow him. 

"There's only one way out of this barn, " explained Max, as he approachedthe door, beside which a groom was standing. "By this door, which isnever locked. There is a window, but it's too high up for anybody to getout by. "

Telling the groom to guard the door, Max went into the barn, followed bythe detective. There was still light enough for them to find their wayabout among the lumber. 

"Where's the window, sir?" asked the detective. 

Max pointed to a speck of light high in the south wall of the barn. 

"She couldn't get out there, " said he, "even if she could climb up toit. Unless she could swarm a rope. "

And he touched one of the ropes which dangled from a huge beam. 

The detective, however, walked rapidly past him, and stopped short, pointing to something which was lying on the floor under the window. 

It was the body of a man, lying in a heap. 

CHAPTER XXV. 

THE MYSTERY EXPLAINED. 

Max helped the detective raise the man from the ground. He was quitedead, and from the position in which they had found him, both menconcluded that he had been in the act of climbing up to the high window, when the rope by which he was holding broke under his weight. It wasevident that he had fallen upon an old millstone which was among thelumber on the floor beneath, and that the shock of the fall had brokenhis neck. 

They had found out all this before Max could form any opinion as to theidentity of the dead man. He was short of stature, and apparentlybetween fifty and sixty years of age, slightly built, but muscular. Thebody was dressed in the clothes of a respectable mechanic. 

There was very little light in the barn by this time, and Max directedthe groom, who had been standing outside, and who had entered, attractedby Max's shout of discovery, to bring a lantern. 

"I suppose we'd better send for a doctor, " said Max, "though the man'sas dead as a doornail. In the meantime, just give a look around and seewhether the woman is anywhere about. "

The detective appeared to follow the suggestion, for he at onceproceeded to a further inspection of the building by the aid of one ofthe two lanterns which the groom had by this time brought. And presentlyhe came back to Max with a bundle in his hand. 

Max, by the light of the lantern which the groom was holding for him, was looking at the face of the dead man, whom he guessed to be one ofMrs. Higgs's accomplices, perhaps the mysterious person whose influenceover the old woman, according to Carrie, was so bad. 

While he was staring intently at the dead face, he heard a stifled cry, and looking up, saw that Carrie had stolen into the barn behind thegroom, and had her eyes fixed upon the body. 

Max sprang up. 

"Do you know him? Is it the man who used to get into the place bynight?" asked he, eagerly. 

Carrie, without answering, looked from the dead man to the detective, and from him to the bundle he was carrying. 

"Ah!" exclaimed she. 

Max looked in his turn. The detective was displaying, one by one, awoman's skirt, bodice, bonnet, shawl and a cap with a "front" of woman'shair sewn inside it. 

"I think you can guess, sir, what's become of the woman now?" said theofficer, grimly. 

Max started violently, shocked by a surprise which, both for thedetective and for Carrie, had been discounted some time ago. 

"Mrs. Higgs" was a man. 

Even with this knowledge to help him, Max, as he stared again at thedead face, found it difficult to recognize in the still features thosewhich in life had inspired him with feelings of repulsion. 

Just a quiet, inoffensive, respectable-looking man not coarse or low intype; this would have been his comment upon the dead man, if he hadknown nothing about him. Max shuddered as he withdrew his gaze; and, ashe did so, he met the eyes of Carrie. 

He beckoned to her to come away with him, and she followed him as far asthe door, toward which some members of the household, to whom the newshad penetrated, were now hastening. 

"Carrie!" cried he, as he looked searchingly in her face, "you knewthis? How long have you known it?"

She could scarcely answer. She was shaking from head to foot, and wasevidently suffering from a great shock. 

"Yes, I knew it, but only since I came here. It was part of what Mr. Dudley Horne let out in his raving. "

"Only part of it?" cried Max. 

But Carrie would confess nothing more. And, as Mr. Wedmore came acrossthe yard at this moment, followed by Dr. Haselden, Carrie ran back intothe house as Max met his father. 

"What's all this about a dead man found in the barn?" asked Mr. Wedmore, with all the arrogance of the country gentleman, who thinks that no onehas a right to die on his premises without his permission. 

Max held his father back for a moment until the doctor had passed on. Inthe excitement of this occurrence, Mr. Wedmore was glad to have anopportunity of appearing to forget that there was any quarrel betweenthem. On second thoughts, he inclined to think that he had perhaps, onthis occasion, been a little too hard on his son, and he was anxious forsome loop-hole by which he could creep out of the consequences of hisown sternness. This, however, could hardly have been guessed by hismanner, which was at least as arrogant as ever. 

"It's somebody who was mixed up in the death of Edward Jacobs, sir, Ithink, " said Max, in a low voice. "A man who has been living down at theEast End of London disguised as a woman, and who was, I believe, at thebottom of all the mischief. "

"Man disguised as a woman?" cried Mr. Wedmore, incredulously. "What animprobable story! And what should he do down here in my barn?"

"I think he must have come down to see Dudley, sir. We believe that itwas he who tried to drown Dudley, after he had succeeded in drowningEdward Jacobs. "

Mr. Wedmore frowned in perplexity. 

"Trying to drown Dudley! What on earth should he do that for? What hadDudley to do with him?"

"Well, sir, we don't quite know. But Dudley was acquainted with thisman, undoubtedly, though we don't know whether he knew him to be a man, or only as Mrs. Higgs, which was the name the man went by. "

"Let me see the man, " said Mr. Wedmore. 

And, pushing past his son, he entered the barn. 

The doctor made way for him. 

"He is quite dead. He must have been killed instantly, " said DoctorHaselden, as his friend came up. 

Mr. Wedmore took the lantern from the man who held it, and looked at thedead face. As he did so, his first expression of curiosity gave place toone of perplexity, followed by a stare of intense amazement and horror. 

"What is it? Do you know him?" asked Doctor Haselden, while Max, who hadfollowed his father in, watched with intense interest and surprise. 

Mr. Wedmore did not seem to hear. He continued to look at the dead facefor some moments with an appearance of utter absorption, and then, suddenly staggering back, he made for the open air without a word ofexplanation. 

Max stared at the doctor, and then followed his father out. But Mr. Wedmore was already half way to the house, where he shut himself intothe study, and locking the door, refused to be disturbed. 

Max was more bewildered than ever by this new turn of affairs. With adogged determination not to be kept any longer out of a secret of whicheverybody but himself seemed to know something, he went straight up tothe sick-room in search of Carrie. His knock, however, was answered bythe professional nurse, who opened the door and asked him what hewanted. 

"Oh, it doesn't matter, " said Max. "At least--I wanted to know how Mr. Horne is now. "

"He won't be so well to-night, I expect, " answered the nurse, tartly. "There's been a great noise and disturbance outside, and he's heardsomething of it, and it's made him restless and curious. He is askingquestions about it all the time, and he won't be satisfied. He keepsasking for the other nurse, who is out taking her walk, as I tell him. "

At this point Dudley's voice was heard from the bed. "Who's that at thedoor? Who is it?"

Max, after a moment's hesitation, during which the nurse assumed an airof washing her hands of the whole matter, answered:

"Me, old chap--Max. How are you?"

Dudley sprang up in bed. The nurse folded her arms and frowned. 

"Come in, oh, come in, just one moment! I'll be quiet, nurse, quitequiet. But I must see him--I must see somebody. "

Max threw an imploring glance at the nurse, who refused to look at him. Then he went in. 

"Only a minute--I won't stay a minute. "

The nurse shrugged her shoulders. 

"It's against the doctor's orders. I wash my hands of the consequences, "said she. 

And, with her head held very high, she left the room. 

Max stood irresolute. By the look of excitement on Dudley's face, hejudged that anything must be better for him than the eager suspense fromwhich he was evidently suffering. This news of the death of the odiousinhabitant of the house by the wharf must surely bring relief to him. Assoon as they were alone together, Dudley burst out eagerly:

"That noise! It's no use deceiving me; I know what it was. They wereafter him. Tell me--has he got away? Has my father got away?"

CHAPTER XXVI. 

BACK TO LOVE AND LIFE. 

Max fell into a chair. He stared at Dudley for a few moments before hecould speak. Dudley's father! The man supposed to have died years andyears ago in an asylum abroad, was the person who had passed as "Mrs. Higgs!" Even before he had had time to learn any of the details of thestrange story, the outlines of it were at once apparent to the mind ofMax. 

Here was, then, the explanation of the mysterious bond between Dudleyand Mrs. Higgs; here was the meaning of his visits to Limehouse. 

Dudley repeated his question before Max had recovered from the shock ofhis surprise. 

"Yes, " said he at last, "he has got away. "

But Dudley detected some reserve in his manner, or perhaps his ownsuspicions were aroused. He looked searchingly at Max, and askedabruptly:

"Is he dead?"

Max looked at him askance. 

"Yes, " he said at last. 

Dudley lay back in his pillows. 

"Thank God!"

And Max knew by the look of intense relief on his friend's face that hehad done right in telling him the truth. 

But, indeed, Max could not guess how intense the relief was from theburden of the secret which Dudley had had to bear for so long; andundoubtedly the discovery that it was a secret no longer, that thenecessity for concealment was now over, helped his recovery materially. 

Max told him, as briefly as possible, the details of the occurrence; buthe neither asked nor invited any more questions. 

It was not until some time afterward, when Dudley had left thesick-room, that the whole of the story became known to the family. But, in the meantime, the inquest on the body brought many facts to light. 

Mrs. Edward Jacobs, the widow of the man who had been found drowned inthe Thames off Limehouse some weeks before, had been, so it wasdiscovered, the person to give information to the police against Dudley, as the suspected murderer of her husband. She had traced to him theweekly postal orders, which she looked upon as blood-money, and she hadthen hung about his chambers, and on one occasion followed him toLimehouse, without, however, penetrating farther than the entrance ofthe wharf. 

Upon the information given by her a warrant was issued against Dudley;but in searching his chambers a number of letters were found, alladdressed to Dudley, which threw a new and lurid light upon the affair. The letters were written by the father to the son, and contained thewhole story of his return to England a few months before; of his anxietyto see his son; his morbid fear of being recognized and shut up as alunatic, and his equally morbid hankering after information concerningEdward Jacobs, the man who had ruined him. 

All these letters, which were directed in a feigned handwriting, seemedsane and sensible enough, although they showed signs of eccentricity ofcharacter. 

The next batch were written after the disappearance of Edward Jacobs, and in them the signs of morbid eccentricity were more apparent. Thewriter owned to having "put Jacobs out of the way, " upbraided Dudley forinterfering on behalf of such a wretch, and accused him of ingratitudein refusing to leave England with his father, who had done mankind ingeneral and him in particular a service in killing a monster. The writerwent on to accuse Dudley of siding with his father's enemies, of wishingto have him shut up, and told him that he should never succeed. 

Some of these letters were directed to The Beeches, and some to Dudley'schambers, showing an intimate knowledge of his whereabouts. 

The latest letters were wilder, more bitter, showing how insanity whichhad broken out into violence before was increasing in intensity, and howthe feelings of regard which he had seemed to entertain for his son hadgiven place to strong resentment against him. 

After the reading of these letters, it was plain that the crime ofmurder which Mrs. Jacobs had laid to Dudley's charge had been really thework of his father; and Mrs. Jacobs herself, on being made acquaintedwith these facts, agreed with this conclusion. 

There remained only the question of Dudley's complicity in the crime tobe considered, and that was a matter which could be left until the sickman's recovery. 

It was on the first day of Dudley's appearance in the family circle thatthe subject was broached, clumsily enough, by Mr. Wedmore, who was dyingto know a great deal more than anybody had been willing to tell him. 

Dudley had come into the drawing-room, which had been well warmed forthe occasion with a roaring fire, and it was here that they found himafter luncheon, with the professional nurse beside him. 

The girls greeted him rather shyly, especially Doreen, but Mrs. Wedmorewas motherly and gentle. Mr. Wedmore attacked him at once. 

"I can't understand, Dudley, why you kept it all so dark. Couldn't yousee for yourself that it was better for your father to be underrestraint, as well as safer for other people?"

Mrs. Wedmore tried to interpose and to change the conversation toanother subject, but Dudley said:

"I would rather explain now, once and for all. I shall be going awayto-morrow, and there are several things which I should like to makeclear first. " He paused, and Mrs. Wedmore, her daughters and the nursetook the opportunity to leave the room. "Now, Mr. Wedmore, tell me whatyou want to know. "

"Well, you told us nothing about your father's being alive and back inEngland, for one thing. "

"It was by his wish that I kept it a secret. He persisted that he wassane; he seemed to be sane. But he believed that if it were known thathe was in England he would be shut up. "

"But the passing himself off as an old woman, this living in a sort ofunderground way, didn't that look like madness?"

"I took it for eccentricity and nothing more, until--until he sent forme one day, and brought me suddenly into a room--a little dark, bareroom--where there was a man lying on the ground asleep, as I thought. Myfather told me to bring him into the next room, and--when I stooped totouch him"--Dudley shuddered at the ghastly recollection--"my hands werecovered with blood. "

"Good gracious! He had murdered him?"

"Yes. And from that time he seemed a different man. I saw that he wasmad. I tried to persuade him to give himself up, to let himself be putunder restraint. I laid traps for him, trying to take him to an asylum. But he was too cunning for me, and all I got by it was to rouse in him abitter feeling of hatred of myself. "

"Why didn't you give information--to the police, if necessary?"

"How could I? My own father! I believed he would be hanged if he wascaught. I believe so still. The last time I saw him he seemed sane, except for a feeling of irritation against me and against Carrie, who, it seems, is my half-sister. But he attacked me suddenly, knocked me onthe head, and tried to drown me. There, now you know as much as I do. Can you wonder now that I was obliged to cut myself off from my friends, with such a burden as that on my mind?"

Mr. Wedmore was silent for a time. 

"Poor lad!" he said at last. "Poor lad! I think you might have foundsome better way out of it than holding your tongue and shutting yourselfup from all your friends; but, on the other hand, it was a jollydifficult position. Jolly difficult! And so you never even told Max?"

"No, though I more than once felt inclined to. But it was such a ghastlybusiness altogether that I thought I'd better hold my tongue, especiallyas--I was afraid--it might filter through him to--to somebodyelse--somebody who couldn't be told a beastly secret like that. "

Mr. Wedmore nodded. 

"And this girl--this Carrie?" said he. 

Dudley's face lighted up. 

"That's my one comfort in all this, " said he, "that it has led to myfinding out the girl and doing something for her. I never heard of herbefore. But my father told me she was my half-sister, and they say thereis something in our faces which confirms the story. Anyhow, she's agrand girl, and I'm going to look after her. She's gone away--"

"Gone away!" repeated Mr. Wedmore, disconcerted. 

There had been a lull in the quarrel between him and his son for thelast few days, during which Carrie had avoided Max and Max had avoidedhis father. 

"Yes, " said Dudley. "She would go, and she thought it best to go withoutany fuss, leaving me to say good-bye for her. She's all right. I'm goingto look after her; and she's going into training as a hospital nurse. "

"Oh, well, I'm sure I hope she'll get on, " said Mr. Wedmore, rathervaguely. 

He had been getting used, during the last few days, to the thought ofthe pretty, blue-eyed girl as a daughter-in-law, and he found himselfnow rather hoping than fearing that Max would stick to his choice. 

"Well, " said he at last, "I must send the ladies to have a look at younow, I suppose. I wouldn't let them talk my head off on the first day, if I were you. "

Dudley sprang to his feet. He seemed restless and excited. 

"I won't talk much. I won't let them talk much, " said he, in an unsteadyvoice. "But may I see--may I speak to Doreen?"

Mr. Wedmore nodded good-humoredly. 

"Well, you may speak to her, if she'll let you, " said he, cheerfully. "But, really, she's a thorny young person. She's treated young Lindsay, the curate, very cruelly, and I'm sure he's a much better looking fellowthan you. However, you can try your luck. "

Dudley did not wait for any more encouragement. No sooner had Mr. Wedmore left the room than the convalescent followed. He found Doreen inthe hall, putting a handful of letters on the table ready for the post. She started when she turned and saw him, and, leaning back with herhands upon the table, she asked him what he meant by leaving the nice, warm, ox-roasting fire they had built up expressly for him upstairs. 

"I hear you've been treating the curate very badly, " said he. "I've cometo ask for an explanation. "

Doreen looked down at the tip of her shoe, and, after a pause, saiddemurely:

"Well, I suppose if you don't know the reason, nobody does. "

"Why, was it anything connected with me, then?"

"So I have been informed, " answered Doreen, more primly than ever. 

And then he waited for her to look up; and when she did, he kissed her. And they didn't exchange a word upon the subject of the longmisunderstanding, but just strolled into the dining-room and sawpictures in the fire together. 

 * * * * *

There was no trial and no scandal; there were rumors, and that was all. Max remained true to his fancy for Carrie, and gave proof of hissincerity by settling down to work in a merchant's office, after themanner so dear to his father's heart. And in return, Mr. Wedmoreconsented to Carrie's being invited down to The Beeches in the spring, to be present at Doreen's wedding. 

And when Carrie came, several details concerning the life led by her andthe supposed Mrs. Higgs in the house by the docks came to light, and thelast remains of the mystery were cleared away. 

She told how her father, passing himself off as Mrs. Higgs, an oldservant in the Horne family, of whom Carrie had heard in the lifetime ofMiss Aldridge, had found her out, had touched her heart by a kindnessevidently genuine, and had prevailed upon her to go and make her home inthe deserted house, which, Mrs. Higgs said, had been intended for her byher late master. 

In the empty house they found that an entrance had been made into theadjoining warehouse, which had been used by a gang of thieves as ahiding-place for stolen goods. In the little front shop these ingeniouspersons had fashioned an ingenious hiding-place by hollowing out atunnel to the river. Into this tunnel the water flowed at high tide; butwhen the tide was low an entrance could be effected from the river, bywhich the thieves could pass in and out, and in which they could safelydeposit, in a chest in the slimy earth, property too valuable to be leftabove ground. 

Carrie explained how Mrs. Higgs fraternized with the thieves, before sheherself guessed who they were, and how she had got used to them beforeshe learned their character, though not before she had grown suspiciousabout them. How she had seen Dudley with Mrs. Higgs, without knowing whohe was, and how she had set him down as a suspicious character from thefurtive manner of his visits. How she herself posted the two letters, the one to Edward Jacobs and the other to Dudley, which brought them tothe place on the same day. How she herself was sent out of the way onthat occasion, and returned in time to witness, through the hole in thefloor above, the stooping over the body by Dudley, and his drawing backcovered with blood, which she took for the actual murder. How Mrs. Higgsand Dudley had then left the house together, while she was too sick withfright to move. How she had remained outside the house until she sawMax; and how, when he was gone, and Mrs. Higgs had come back, she foundthat the manner of the supposed old woman had changed toward her andgrown unbearably cruel and harsh. How she had been left for days andnights by herself, until she resolved to bear it no longer. And how, when Mrs. Higgs had sent her to Dudley's chambers with the message aboutDick Barker, she had told her never to come back again. 

Carrie added that she herself had always been treated with kindness, notonly by the gang, of whom, indeed, they saw little, but by such of themen and boys on the barges which came to the wharf as knew her, and"winked" at her unauthorized tenancy of the deserted house. 

In broad daylight, in the company of half a dozen policemen, Max andDudley revisited the house together. They found the holes in the wallthrough which "Mrs. Higgs" took stock of Max on the occasion of hisfirst visit; they tested the ingenious device by means of which themiddle boards in the front shop could be made to fall and depositanything laid upon them in the tunnel beneath. They found the hole inwhich Mrs. Higgs had stepped, and the pole which had been used tounderpin the middle boards. This hole extended under the floor of thekitchen, so that by creeping under the flooring from the one room to theother the pole could be withdrawn or replaced without the knowledge of aperson in the front room. 

This final discovery explained to Max the manner in which the body ofJacobs had been made to disappear while he himself was in the room withit. 

The gang, of which the illustrious Dick Barker had formed one, hadwisely disappeared, never to return. 

But one day, when Carrie, in her nurse's dress, was walking along OxfordStreet, in the company of Max, to whom, with Mr. Wedmore's permission, she was now engaged, she felt a hand in her pocket, and turning quickly, found that she was having her purse stolen, "for auld lang syne, " byDick Barker. 

Max recognized in the well-dressed young man, with the low type of face, the man whom he had once supposed to be his rival. 

As Dick promptly disappeared, Carrie and Max looked at each other, andthe girl burst into tears. 

"Oh, Max, if it hadn't been for you--" whispered she, as she dried hereyes quickly and hurried on with him. 

"And, oh, Carrie, if it hadn't been for you--" whispered Max back, as hetook her into the shop of the Hungarian Bread Company, and made her havea cup of tea.