Chapter 14

Picnic Supper--Sentries--Sylvanus' Silence--Coristine and Bigglethorpe Hear Sounds--Invaders Repelled--Fire and Explosions--Victims Walled In--Water Retreat in the Rain--The Constable Secures Mark Davis--Walk Home in the Rain--Bangs and Matilda--Into Dry Clothes--Miss Carmichael's Mistake--A Reef in Mr. Bangs--Ben has no Clothes--Three Young Gentlemen in a Bad Way.

Mr. Bangs had no fewer than eight men under his command, Bigglethorpe and the two Richards at the water, and Coristine and the veteran, the two Pilgrims and Rufus, up above. The latter tired themselves out, under the detective's direction, looking for an opening in the ground, but found none, nor anything that in the least resembled one. Some of the searchers wondered why the chimney in Rawdon's house was so unnecessarily large and strong, but no examination about its base revealed any connection between it and an underground passage. The detective, in conference with Mr. Terry and the lawyer, decided on four sentries, namely one each at the house and the lake, as already set, one at the road looking towards the entrance, and the other half way between the lake and the house, to keep up the connection. Some bread and meat and a pot of tea, with dishes, were sent down to the three men on the shore by the hands of Timotheus, but they rejected the cold meat, having already made a fire, and broiled the bass caught by Mr. Bigglethorpe. They had a very jolly time, telling fish stories, till about eight o'clock, and the fisherman of Beaver River was in wonderful spirits over the discovery of a new fishing ground. If those lakes had only contained brook trout he would move his store to the Lakes Settlement; as it was, he thought of setting up a branch establishment, and getting a partner to occupy the two places of business alternately with him. The Richards boys were pleased to think that their new acquaintance was likely to be a permanent one, and made Mr. Bigglethorpe many sincere offers of assistance in his fishing, and subordinate commercial, ventures. At eight Mr. Bangs came down the hill, and posted one of the Richards as sentry, while the fisherman indulged in his evening smoke, preparatory to turning in under the skiff with his friend Bill. "I went that fire put out, gentlemen," said the detective, "net now, but say efter ten o'clock, as it might help the enemy to spy us out," to which Bill Richards replied: "All right, cap'n; she'll be dead black afore ten." Rufus was placed on the hill side to communicate between the distant posts; Timotheus overlooked the encampment; and Sylvanus was given the station on the road. Mr. Bangs walked about nervously, and the lawyer and Mr. Terry, bringing some clean coverlets out of the boarding-house, spread them on the chip-covered ground, and lay down to smoke their pipes and talk of many things. "Oi tuk to yeez, sorr," said the veteran with warmth, "soon as Oi mit ye in the smokin' carr, and to think what a dale av loife we've seen since, an' here's you an' me, savin' yer prisince, as thick as thaves."

Nothing of any moment occurred till within a quarter of ten, when Sylvanus saw two figures suddenly start up close by him on the right. At first, he thought of challenging them, but seeing one was a woman, and remembering the going over the Squire gave him about capturing Tryphosa, he resolved to await their arrival. Both figures greeted him joyfully by his name, for it was his two proteges, the crazy woman and her son, who had escaped the constable and lain concealed until darkness veiled their movements. "Has Steevy woke up yet?" she asked the sentinel, quietly.

"Not as I know on," responded the elder Pilgrim.

"Then we will slip quietly into the house, and get some supper for Monty, and go to bed. It's tiresome walking about all day," she continued.

"Don't you two go fer to make no noise, 'cos they's sentries out as might charlinge yer with their guns," remarked the compassionate guard.

"No," she whispered back; "we will be still as little mice, won't we, Monty? Good night, Sylvanus!" The boy added, "Good night, Sylvy!" and the sentinel returned the salutation, and muttered to himself: "Pore souls, the sight on 'em breaks me all up."

Sylvanus should have reported these arrivals, when the detective came to relieve him, and put Mr. Terry in his place, but he did not. He had forgotten all about them, and was wondering if that "kicked-out-of service old ramrod, the corpular, was foolin' round about Trypheeny." Coristine relieved Timotheus; Bill Richards, Rufus; and Mr. Bigglethorpe, Harry Richards. The relieved men went to sleep on the quilts and under the skiff. Mr. Bangs came up every quarter of an hour to the lawyer, and asked if he had heard a noise about the house, to which the sentinel replied in the affirmative every time; whereupon the detective would take a lamp and search the building from top to bottom without any result. Once, after such a noise, that sounded like some heavy article being dragged along, Coristine thought he heard the words: "Keep quiet, Tilly," and, "Take it hoff," but he was not sure. The night was cloudy and dark, and the mosquitoes' buzzing sometimes had a human sound, while the snoring of the Pilgrims, and the restless moving of the horses, brought confusion to the ear, which sought to verify suspected articulations. Had he known that Matilda Nagle was about the house, he would not have let Bangs rest until the mystery was solved. He did not know; and, being very tired and sleepy, was inclined to distrust the evidence of his senses and lay it to the charge of imagination.

Down by the water's edge Mr. Bigglethorpe sat on a stone in front of the carved out block, thinking of the best fly for bass, and of a great fishing party to the lakes that should include Mr. Bulky. Standing up to stretch his legs and facing the block of limestone, he thought he saw a narrow line of light along the left perpendicular incision. Moving over, he saw the same perpendicular line on the right. Just then the clouds drifted off the moon, and he convinced himself that the light lines were reflections from the sheen that glimmered over the lake. He also thought he heard a whining noise, such as a sick person or a child might make, and then a rough voice saying: "Stow that now!" but Richards, like the two Pilgrims above, was snoring, and Harry had a slight cold in his head. "What a stoopid, superstitious being I should become," said the fisherman to himself, "if I were out here long all alone." But, hark! the sound of paddles softly dipping came from the left, and at once the sentry lay down behind the upturned skiff, and, gun in hand, listened. He poked Richards with his foot, and, as he awoke, enjoined silence. Richards crawled out, and quietly replaced the boat in its original position. There were now two on guard instead of one. The boat entered the lake. It was the scow, Richards' scow, and Harry was indignant. There were five men in it, and they were talking in a low tone.

"Quite sure them blarsted Squire folks has all gone home, Pete?"

"Sartin, I seen 'em, the hull gang's scattered and skee-daddled, parsons an' all."

"Where's the blarsted light, then?"

"Seems to me I kin see long, thin streaks. O Lawr, boys, Rodden must ha' been hard put, when he drapped the block into the hole. It's shet up tight. Hev ye got the chisel and mallet?"

"They're all right."

"Then less git ashore and drap the block out, though it's an orful pity to lose it in the drink."

"Carn't we git the blarsted thing back to its place agin?"

"Onpossible; wild horses couldn't do it."

Harry whispered to Bigglethorpe: "What'll we do?" and the fisherman answered: "Our duty is to fire, but we weren't told to kill anybody. Don't you fire till I reload."

Then Bigglethorpe called out: "Surrender in the Queen's name," and fired above the scow. Two or three pistol shots rattled over the sentries' heads, and flattened themselves on the rock behind. "All ready!" said the storekeeper, and Harry let fly his duck shot into the middle of the crowd, who paddled vigorously from the shore. Bill Richards, having alarmed the upper sentries by the discharge of his gun, came running down, with the Pilgrims and Rufus, led by the detective, not far behind him. "Shove out the skiff," called Bigglethorpe. The Richards shoved it off, and Bill rowed, when the two sentries got on board. "Go it, Bill, after the old tub," cried Harry; "we'll soon catch up." The Rawdon gang worked hard to get to the narrows, but found it hopeless. "Give it to them," shouted Bangs from the shore; and in response, the guns rang out again, while Bill strained every muscle to the utmost. The punt grounded on the shore above the narrows, and four of the men jumped out into the water and fled up the bank, firing their pistols as they retired. The punt was captured, and brought back to the guarded beach, with a wounded man and some tools in the bottom. Only by swimming, or by a long detour of very many miles, could the four fugitives find their way back to the shore they had sought in vain.

The wounded man was taken out of the punt and laid on the beach. "Is he dead?" asked Bigglethorpe. "No," answered the detective, feeling the head of the victim, and inspecting him by the aid of matches struck by the smoker Sylvanus; "it's a good thing for him thet yore two gens were louded with deck shot end thet they sketter sow, else he'd a been a dead men. He's got a few pellets in the beck of his head, jest eneugh to sten the scoundrel for a few minutes. Ah, he's hed a creck owver the top of his head with a cleb, the colonel's werk, very likely."

"Do you want him kept?" enquired Mr. Bigglethorpe, as sentry.

"Oh, dear me, yes; he's Rawdon's chief men. I wouldn't lose him fer a hendred dollars. Rufus, do you mind blowing his brains out if he attempts to escaype?"

The good-natured Rufus said he didn't mind watching the prisoner, but he imagined clubbing would be kinder than blowing out his brains.

"All right!" answered the detective, "all right, so long as you keep him safely."

So Mr. Bangs went back to the house, followed by Sylvanus, Timotheus and Bill Richards, the last of whom resumed his post, namely the trunk on which Pierre Lajeunesse had rested.

When the encampment was reached, Mr. Bangs asked Coristine if he had been smoking on guard or lighting matches, but he had not. He asked Mr. Terry the same question, which the old soldier almost took as an insult. "An' is it to me ye come, axin' av Oi shmoke on guarrd, an' shpind my toime loightin' matches loike a choild? Oi've sane sarvice, sorr, and nobody knows betther fwhat his juty is."

"I sincerely beg your pardon, Mr. Terry. Please excuse my enxiety; I smell fire."

"Don't mintion it, sorr, betune us. Faix, an' it's foire I shmill an' moighty sthrong, too."

The detective came back to the front of the house, and saw the fire that had broken forth in a moment, and was flaming in every room of basement and upper storey, a fire too rapidly advanced to be got under, even had the means been at hand.

"Quick, Sylvanus, Timotheus, get out the horses and any other live stock," he cried; but the lawyer had been before him, and the two Pilgrims and he were already leading the frightened animals past the house and on to the road, where they turned their heads outward and drove them along. Forgetting their watch, Mr. Terry and Bangs himself helped, until every living creature, as they thought, was safely away on the road to the Lake Settlement. Then, two figures, that the guilty Sylvanus knew, came out of the door of the boarding house, and the flames leaped out after them. The woman came up to Coristine, and said: "I know you; you helped to carry poor Steevy, who is not awake yet. He said it was cold down there, so Monty and I have made a fire to keep him warm." The lawyer thought she meant that her dead brother was cold. As to the fire, when he saw Monty, it did not astonish him; but how came they both there through the guard?

The frame buildings, their light clapboards dried by the summer sun, burned furiously, and the flames roared in the rising wind. The sheds and stables caught; the fire ran over the ground, in spite of the dew, catching in shrubs and fallen timber, and even climbing up living trees. Back the beholders were driven, as far as Bill Richards' post, by the terrible glare and heat of the conflagration. Leaving Bigglethorpe on sentry, and Rufus over the prisoner, Harry came running up to learn what was the matter, and to tell of noises like human voices and hammer blows behind the slab of rock. Then, as the fire in the house burned down to the ground, there was an explosion that seemed to shake the earth, and a column of fire sprang up the standing chimney, side by side with another less lofty and more diffused from the right of the building. Report after report followed, and the whole party, half terror-stricken, descended to the beach. Rufus, with Bigglethorpe's help, had considerately transferred his prisoner to the punt, and guarded him there. The store-keeper, taking chisel and mallet in hand, was striking off chip after chip of rock, in answer to muffled cries from within; and now the big rock had moved half an inch. Still the brave man worked away amid the continued explosions, and in spite of the advancing fire. The block continued to slide, and Bigglethorpe cried: "Take the boats out of the way, and get back from me, or you will all be crushed in a minute." The punt was out of danger, but Bill Richards, with a single movement, shoved off the skiff, and, kneeling on her stern, sent her far out into the lake. Then he rowed the boat rapidly back into a place of safety. The slab was still sliding, and had cleared the rock out of which it had been cut by an inch. A human hand was thrust out, a dumpy, beringed hand, bleeding with the effort; a most audible voice cried "For God's sake, 'urry!" and then there came a perfect Babel of explosions, and the gallant deliverer was forcibly drawn out of a fierce river of liquid fire that streamed down into the lake, and burned even out on the water. The fisherman was badly burnt, hair, beard and eyelashes almost singed off; but still he thought of rescue. "Fire at that miserable little chip that holds it," he cried; "fire, since you can't hit it otherwise. Oh, for an asbestos suit, and I would have styed." They fired pistol and gun with no effect, till the lawyer, out in the skiff with Bill, got his rifle sighted to the point in the blue flame, where he thought the preventing ridge ought to be. He fired at close range, the ball hit the rock projection, and at once the great block slid away into the lake, with a splash that damped the flames with a column of spray, and revealed an awful corridor of fire. No living creature was there, but the detective, dipping his feet in the lake, took a boat hook out of the returning skiff, and then, standing in the flames, hauled out two charred masses, and extinguished them in the shallow water by the shore.

Mr. Terry came running down and crying: "Out on the wather wid yeez, ivery mother's son av yeez; the foire's spreadin' an' the threes is fallin'; fer yer loife, min." Mr. Bangs, still in command, asked:--

"How many will the skiff howld, Bill?"

"Seven, anyway," replied the Richards of that name.

"Mr. Coristine and Mr. Terry take commend and choose crew."

"Come, Matilda and Monty," said the lawyer.

"Come on, Sylvanus, Timotheus, Rufus," cried Mr. Terry.

"I'll row," said the Irishman.

"And me, too," added Sylvanus.

"Look after my prisoner, Mr. Bangs," cried Rufus; and the skiff went out to sea.

Bill transferred himself to the scow, with his brother Harry and Mr. Bigglethorpe. The detective lifted the two charred masses to the opposite side of the middle thwart from that against which the prisoner lay. Then, Bill and Bigglethorpe having taken the bow, he and Harry took the stern, and the scow followed the skiff. For a time the two boats stood stock still, fascinated by the awful scene. The explosions were over, but the forest was blazing fiercely, and up towards the smouldering buildings, but underground, blazed a vault of blue fire that reached up to the standing brick chimney of Rawdon's house. Hundreds of animals were in the water around them, squirrels and snakes and muskrats, even mice, swimming for dear life. Then, pitter, patter, came the rain, hissing on the flames. It fell more heavily; and the lawyer, having doffed his coat to row, threw it over the woman's shoulders, while Mr. Terry put that of Sylvanus about the boy. "Lead on, Mr. Coristine," cried the detective; and the skiff shot through the narrows, with the punt hard after it. The rain fell in torrents and drenched the occupants of both vessels; but those whose faces were towards the stern could see the bush-fire still raging. "The rain'll stop it spreadin'," Bill called out cheerfully, and the lawyer rejoiced, because the fire was on Miss Du Plessis' land. Long was the journey, tired were the rowers and paddlers, and draggled was the crew, or rather draggled were the crews, that reached the Richards' homestead. The prisoner was awake by this time, had been so all along since he was deposited in the punt, and a paddle had splashed his face. When walked ashore, he had made a dash for liberty, but Mr. Bangs had brought him up short. "Yore in too great a herry, Merk Devis," he had said; "we went you, my men, and we'll hev you, dead or alive." So Mark Davis, since that was the name of Wilkinson's dissipated farmer, had to fall into line and march to the Richards' place. There the party found Maguffin and the constable.

The colonel's servant had been much closer to the conflagration, but, having seen no sign of any person there, nothing but a number of startled horses, and the fire having taken possession of the sides of the masked road, he had retired to the nearest house. He at once enquired after the safety of Mr. Terry and the lawyer, and, finding that they and all the rest of the party were safe, rode back at his utmost speed to report. The constable, rejoiced at seeing his prisoners again, was about to rearrest them, when Coristine and Sylvanus interposed, the latter threatening to thrash the pipe-clay out of the pensioner's "old putrified jints" if he touched the boy. The Crew meant petrified, but the insult was no less offensive to the corporal on account of the mistake. As a private individual in the Squire's kitchen, Mr. Rigby was disposed to peace and unwilling to engage in a contest with big-boned Sylvanus, but, as a constable on duty, he was prepared to face any number of law-breakers and to fight them to the death. Drawing his baton, he advanced, and only the commands of his legal superior, Mr. Bangs, backed by the expostulations of the pseudo sergeant-major Terry, induced him to refrain from recapturing his former prisoners, and from adding to them the profane Pilgrim who had been guilty of interfering with an officer in the discharge of his duty. Finally he was mollified by being put in possession of a really great criminal, Mark Davis, whom he at once searched and deprived of various articles, including a revolver, all the chambers of which were fortunately empty. Then, producing his own revolver, the corporal gave it to his prisoner to smell, remarking that, if he tried any nonsense, he would have a taste of it that he would remember. Mrs. Richards was busy reducing the inflammation of Mr. Bigglethorpe's burns. She insisted that he should go no farther that night, and the whole Richards family, which had greatly taken to the fisherman, combined to hold him an honoured prisoner. Mr. Bigglethorpe consented to remain, and the Bridesdale contingent bade him and his hosts good night. The constable went first with his prisoner, followed by Matilda Nagle, between the lawyer and the detective. Monty came next, clinging to Sylvanus and Mr. Terry, while Timotheus and Rufus brought up the rear. Mrs. Richards had furnished the woman and her boy with two shiny waterproofs, called by the young Richards gum coats, so that Coristine and Sylvanus got back their contributions to the wardrobe of the insane, but, save for the look of the thing, they would have been better without them, since they only added a clammy burden to thoroughly water-soaked bodies.

Still the rain fell in torrents. It trickled in many rills off the penthouses of the pedestrians' headgear; from the lapels of coats and from waistcoats it streamed down, concentrating itself upon soggy knees. Broad sheets, like the flow of a water-cart, radiated from coat tails of every description; and rivers descending trouser-legs, turned boots and shoes into lakes, which sodden stockinged feet pumped out in returning fountains. Happily there was no necessity for using gun or pistol, since these weapons shared in the general pervading moisture. Yet the corporal marched erect, with his left hand on his prisoner's shoulder. Poor Matilda was cheerful, though shivering, and, turning round to her boy, said; "It is a good thing, Monty, that we lit the fire when we did, for it would be very hard to light one now;" to which the lad answered, "I hain't a goin' to light no more fires no more." Sylvanus and the veteran had been telling him what a bad thing it was to set houses on fire, and the hypnotized boy, freed apparently from the mesmeric bond by the death of his unnatural father, responded to the counsels of his new friends. The influence lasted longer with Matilda, for as, in spite of the absorbing rain, her companions were able to make a study of her talk, they observed that it was controlled by one or two overmastering ideas, which were evidently the imposition of a superior will. In his dog-Latin, which he presumed the poor woman could not understand, Mr. Bangs said to the lawyer: "_Oportet dicere ad Doctorem dehypnotizere illem feminem._" To this elegant sentence Mr. Coristine briefly answered, "_Etiam_," but soon afterwards he asked: "Where did you pick up your Latin, Mr. Bangs."

"I wes at school, you know where, with pore Nesh; _mulier nescit nomen_. We both took to Letin, because we could talk without being understood by the common crowd. You find velgar criminals thet know some French, German, Spenish or Portegese, bet none thet know Letin. In dealing with higher class criminals we used our own gibberish or artificial shibboleth."

"A sort of Volapuk?"

"Exectly; pore Nesh was ohfelly clever et it."

"I am going to kill Mr. Nash as soon as I can find him," interrupted the woman, in an amiable tone of voice, as if she proposed to discharge some pleasant duty.

The men shuddered, and Mr. Bangs said: "You know, my dear Matilda, what the Bible says, Thou shelt not kill. You surely would not kemmit the sin of merder?"

"I am not to mind what the Bible says, or what Steevy says, or what clergymen or any other people say. I am only to do what he says, and I must."

"Did he tell you to light thet fire?"

"Not that fire, but the other said it was cold down there."

"Why did he not come up?"

"Because I covered the trap over with the big stones, and Monty helped me."

"Surely he didn't tell you to dreg the stones on to the trep?"

"Yes, he did, but not then. It was before, when Flower wanted to get up, and crawl away and tell, because he thought he was going to die."

"Was Flower down there with him?"

"Yes; that's why Monty and I put the big stones on the trap."

"Flower was hert, wesn't he, shot in the beck, I think?"

"Yes; he crawled in all the way on his hands and knees, and I helped his wife to tie him up, till the doctor came, the morning that I found Steevy."

"How do you know thet Stephen wes esleep?"

"He told me."

"_Deminus Coristinus, mulier non est responsibilis pro suis ectionibus. Facit et credit omnia qua mendet enimel mertuus._"

"_Eheu domine!_" replied the lawyer; "_sic est vita dolorosa!_"

Bridesdale was all lit up, and the front door was open to receive the soaked wayfarers, but no one could be induced to enter it. Mr. Terry asked Honoria to leave his dry suit and a pair of shoes at the kitchen, when he would take them to the carriage house, and change there. The lawyer and the detective had no dry suit, so Mrs. Carruthers brought them some of her husband's clothes, and two umbrellas, under which they carried their bundles, wrapped in bath towels, to the place the veteran had chosen. While the three drawing-room guests stripped, rubbed themselves down with the grateful towels, and put on their dry attire, the kitchen filled up with the humid and steaming Pilgrims, Rufus, the idiot boy, and his mother. Constable Rigby lodged his prisoner on some straw in an empty stall in the stable, and, producing a pair of handcuffs, which he had left there, secured him, fastening also a stall chain round one of his legs with a padlock. The constable was severe, but he had lost two prisoners the previous day, had been abused by Sylvanus Pilgrim, and was very wet and tired. To the credit of Sylvanus be it said, that he came out with Ben Toner's clothes, and lent them to his elderly rival, and actually carried the corporal's wet garments into the kitchens, there to hang with a large assortment of others, drying before the two stoves, in full blast for the purpose. The gum coats had fairly protected the clothes of Matilda and Monty, but their feet needed reclothing, and it took some time to dry their heads. Maguffin had taken off his wet things, and was asleep in the loft bed, keeping one ear open for the safekeeping of the colonel's horses. Tryphena and Tryphosa were both up; and into their hands Rufus consigned the dripping habiliments of their two admirers as well as his own, his fraternal relation allowing him to appear before the ladies of the kitchen in a long white garment with frills that had never been constructed for a man. "Guess it ain't the last time you'll have to dry them clothes, gals," said the sportive Rufus, skipping along in his frilled surplice, when Tryphena chased him out of the apartment with a sounding smack between the shoulders. Tryphena hesitated to send the mad woman into the room in which Serlizer was sleeping, not knowing the nature of their relations at the Select Encampment. Matilda, however, evidenced no intention of retiring, or feeling of drowsiness. She talked, with the brightness and cheerfulness of other days, and in a gentle, pleasant voice, but on strange wild themes that terrified the two young women. Monty looked at the fire and then at Tryphosa, saying: "I hain't a goin' to light no more fires no more." "Why?" asked Tryphosa, and the answer came, which revealed a genuine working of the intellect: "'Cos Sylvy says hit's wicked." His mother turned, and said: "Monty, you must not mind what Sylvanus says or anybody else; you must mind what he says."

The boy looked his mother full in the face, and replied in a very decided tone, "Hi'm blowed hif I do!"

In the forepart of the house, only the ladies were up. The doctor and the colonel, the captain and the Squire, slept the sleep of tired men with good consciences, and the wounded dominie was enjoying a beautiful succession of rose-coloured dreams, culminating in a service, at which a tall soldierly man in appropriate costume gave away into his hand that of a very elegant and accomplished lady, saying, as he did so, "Can I do less for the heroic saver of her uncle's life?" Mr. Terry's appearance, on entering to salute his daughter, exacted no remark. The lawyer looked somewhat bucolic, but highly respectable. But poor little Mr. Bangs was buried in clothing, and tripped on his overflowing trowser legs, as he vainly strove to put his right hand outside of its coatsleeve, for the purpose of shaking hands with the company. Mrs. Carmichael took pity on him, and turned back his cuffs, and, his hands being thus of use to him, he employed them to do the same with the skirts of his trousers. The usually polite veteran took Coristine to a corner of the room, and, between violent coughs of suppressed laughter, said: "Och, Misther Coristine, it's the dumb aguey I'll be havin' iv his clawthes is not droied soon. It's Bangs by name he is and bangs by natur'. Shure, this bangs Banagher, an' Banagher bangs the world." The young ladies had not yet entered the apartment, and the three night-watchers were busy relating to the three matrons the terrible events of the night. The lawyer was sitting with his back to the door, conversing with Mrs. Carruthers, when Miss Carmichael came tripping in, followed by Miss Du Plessis and Miss Halbert. The lawyer's hair was brown, and so was her uncle's. The coat was the Squire's, and the white collar above it. So she slipped softly up to the back of the chair, took the brown head between her hands, and administered a salute on the forehead, with the words: "Why, Uncle John!--," then suddenly turned and fled, amid the laughter of the veteran and his daughter, and the amused blushes and smiles of her mother. The other young ladies came forward and joined in the conversation, but Miss Carmichael did not show her face until the family was summoned for prayers. The colonel came down in his usual urbane smiling way, saying that he had taken the liberty of looking in upon his dear friend and prisoner, and was rejoiced to find that he had spent a good night. The captain could be heard descending the staircase, and telling somebody that he was becalmed again with a spell of foul weather. The somebody was the Squire, who insisted that thieves had been through his wardrobe, and then eagerly asked for news from the encampment. All were shocked beyond measure when they heard of the terrible tragedy. "I wished the man no good," said the Squire, with a regretful expression on his manly face, "but, if he had been ten times the deep dyed villain he was, I couldn't have dreamt of such an awful fate for him." The captain remarked that in the midst of life we are in death, that the ways of Providence are mysterious, and that where a man makes his bed he must lie down, all of which he considered to be good Scripture and appropriate to the occasion. "Yoah fohce met with no moah casualties, I hope, Captain Bangs? I do not see our fishing friend, Mr. Bigglethorpe; is he safe, suh?" These questions led to an account of the fisherman's heroic attempt to release the self-imprisoned occupants of the underground passage, of his wounds, and of the subsequent exploits of the lawyer and the detective. Coristine escaped upstairs to put himself in shape for breakfast, and to visit his wounded friend. He found that gentleman progressing very favourably, and perfectly satisfied with his accommodation.

After morning prayers, conducted by the Squire with unusual solemnity, the lawyer asked Miss Carmichael if she alone would not shake hands with him, making no allusion to any previous encounter. She complied, with a blush, and seemed pleased to infer that the Captain, above all, had not heard of her mistake. The two had no time for explanations, however, as, at the moment, Messrs. Errol and Perrowne, who had been told there was a fire out towards the Lake Settlement, came in to learn about it, and were compelled to sit down and add something substantial to their early cup of coffee. They reported the rain almost over, and the fire, so far as they could judge from the distance, the next thing to extinguished. Once more the trays were in requisition for the invalids, and again the colonel and Mr. Perrowne acted as aids to Miss Du Plessis and Miss Halbert. Just as soon as he could draw her attention away from the minister, Coristine remarked to Miss Carmichael: "I have the worst luck of any man; I never get sick or wounded or any other trouble that needs nursing." The young lady said in a peremptory manner, "Show me your hands;" and the lawyer had to exhibit two not very presentable paws. She turned them palms up, and shuddered at the scorched, blistered and scratched appearance of them. "Where are Mr. Errol's gloves I put on you?"

"In the pocket of my wet coat in the kitchen."

"Why did you dare to take them off when I put them on?"

"Because I was like the cat in the proverb, not that I was after mice you know, but I couldn't fire in gloves."

"Well, your firing is done now, and I shall expect you to come to me in the workroom, immediately after breakfast, to have these gloves put on again. Do you hear me, sir?"

"Yes."

"And what else? Do you mean to obey?"

"Oh, yes, Miss Carmichael, of course, always, with the greatest joy in the world."

"Nobody asked you, sir, to obey always."

"I beg your pardon, Miss Carmichael, I'm afraid I'm a little confused."

"Then I hope you will not put me to confusion, as you did this morning."

"I'm awfully sorry," said the mendacious lawyer, "but it was the coat and collar, you know." Then most illogically, he added, "I'd like to wear this coat and this collar all the time."

"No, you would not; they are not at all becoming to you. Oh, do look at poor Mr. Bangs!"

The detective's sleeves were turned back, thanks to Mrs. Carmichael, but, as he sat at breakfast, the voluminous coat sagged over his shoulder, and down came the eclipsing sleeve over his coffee cup. When he righted matters with his left hand, the coat slewed round to the other side, knocked his fork out of his hand, and fell with violence on his omelet. The Captain looked at him, and bawled: "I say, mate, you've got to have a reef took in your back topsel. You don't mind a bit of reef tackle in the back of your coat, do you, John?" The Squire did not object; so Miss Carmichael was despatched to the sewing room for two large pins, and she and the Captain between them pinched up the back of the coat longitudinally to the proper distance, and pinned the detective up a little more than was necessary.

"Whey," asked he of his nautical ally, "em I consistent es a cherecter in bowth phases of my berrowed cowt?"

"I know," chuckled the Captain; "'cause then you had too much slack on your pins, and now you've got too much pins in your slack, haw! haw!"

"Try egain."

Coristine ventured, "Because then your hands were in your cuffies, but now your coffee's in your hand." This was hooted down as perfectly inadmissible, Miss Carmichael asking him how he dared to make such an exhibition of himself. Mr. Errol was wrestling with something like Toulouse and Toulon, but could not conquer it. Then the detective said: "If the ledies will be kind eneugh not to listen, I should enswer, Before I wes loose in my hebits, end now I em tight."

Of course the Captain applauded, but the lawyer's reprover remarked to him that she did not think that last at all a nice word. He agreed with her that it was abominable, that no language was strong enough to reprobate it, and then they left the table.

There was trouble in the kitchen. Timotheus and Maguffin had each a Sunday suit of clothes, which they had donned. Sylvanus and Rufus having special claims on Tryphena, she had put their wet garments in a favourable place, and, being quite dry, handed them in to her befrilled brother, early in the morning, through a half open doorway. The constable, attired in the garb presented to him by Sylvanus, having fastened his prisoner securely with a second stall chain, entered the house, and politely but stiffly wished the cook and housemaid "Good morning." Breakfast was ready, and then the trouble began. Ben had no clothes, and the boys enjoyed the joke. The company was again a large one, for Serlizer and Matilda Nagle were added to the feminine part of it, and the constable and the boy brought its male members up to six, exclusive of the prostrate Ben. Mr. Terry had temporarily deserted the kitchen. Mr. Toner's voice could be heard three doors off calling for Sylvanus, Timotheus, Rufus, Mr. Rigby and Mr. Maguffin. These people were all smilingly deaf, enjoying their hot breakfast. Then, in despair, he called Serlizer.

"What's the racket, Ben?"

"My close is sto-ul, Serlizer."

"They's some duds hangin' up here and in the back kitchen to dry. Praps yourn's there."

"No, Serlizer, myuns never got wayt. You don't think I was sech a blame fooul as to go out in that there raiun do you?"

"Didn't know but what yer might."

"Whey's them close, anyway?"

"I don't know nuthun 'bout yer clothes. Most men as ain't marrd looks after they own clothes."

"Is that you Ben?" asked the more refined voice of Tryphena, in a tone of surprise.

"Yaas, Trypheeny, that's jest who it is. Saay, ken you tayl me what's come o' my close?"

"They are here, Ben, close to the table;" whereupon all the company glanced at Mr. Rigby, and choked.

"Cayn't you take 'em off what they're on, and saynd one of the boys in with 'em, Trypheeny?"

The cook coloured up, and laughter could no longer be restrained. The constable laughed, and the contagion spread to Matilda and her boy.

"Dod rot it?" cried Mr. Toner, indignantly; "what are you fools and eejuts a screechin' and yellin' at? Gimme my close, or, s'haylp me, I'll come right out and bust some low down loafer's thinkin' mill."

"Now, be quiet, Ben," answered Tryphena, "and I will send Rufus in with your breakfast. You shall have your clothes when they are ready."

So, Rufus took in a plentiful breakfast to his friend Toner, who sat up in the big bed to enjoy it. "I'm powerful sorry for you, Ben," remarked the Baby. "You don't think Serlizer could ha' come in and taken your clothes out into the rain, do you?"

"Hev they been out in the rain, Rufus?"

"Why yes, didn't you know that much? If it hadn't been for the constable, they might ha' been out there yet. I'd say thank ye to him if I was you, Ben."

"Consterble Rigby!" shouted Toner.

"At your service, sir," replied the pensioner.

"I'm awful obligated to you, consterble, fer bringin' in my wayt close."

"Do not speak of it, sir," replied Mr. Rigby, with a large piece of toast apparently in his mouth; "I am proud to do you a service, sir."

Ben was a big man, and somewhat erratic in his ways, so the constable retired, and came back in his own garb, which he had carried out with him. "I think, Miss Hill," he said, "that Mr. Toner's clothes are now dry enough for him to wear them with safety. What do you think, Miss Newcome?"

"Guess we kin take them off now," answered Serlizer.

"Serlizer," growled Ben, "you're an old cat, a desprit spiteful chessacat, to go skylarkin' on yer own feller as never did yer no harm. Gerlong with yer!"

Rufus came in for the breakfast things, and deposited Ben's clothes on the bed. "It wasn't Serlizer, Ben, sure; If I was you I'd try the nigger. Them darkies are always up to tricks."

Mr. Toner got into his clothes, resolved to have it out with somebody, even if Rufus himself should prove to be the traitor. When, a few minutes later, Mr. Terry, smoking his morning pipe, foregathered with Ben in the stable yard, and asked him what he was after now, the answer he gave was: "Lookin' araound fer somebody to whayul!" to which the veteran replied: "Bin, my lad, it's aisy talkin'."

When the men were out of the kitchen, Mrs. Carruthers and her sister-in-law came in to see the mad woman and her boy. The boy they knew already, and had always been kind to, giving him toys and other little presents, as well as occasional food and shelter. They were much taken with the mother's quiet manners, and, having heard that she had been a milliner, invited her to join them in the workroom. But, when they unitedly arrived at the door of that apartment, they speedily retired to the parlour, and there engaged in conversation. Mrs. Du Plessis was upstairs, with the colonel to play propriety, sponging the dominie's face and hands, and brushing his hair, as if he were her own son. Every now and again Colonel Morton came up to the bedside, saying: "Be kind to him, my deah Tehesa, and remembeh that he saved the life of yoah poah sistah Cecilia's widowah." So the stately Spanish lady shook up the wounded man's pillows, while the colonel put his arm around him and held him up; and then, as he sank back again, she asked. "Are you strong enough to have Cecile come up and read to you?" Wilkinson, sly dog, as the Captain called him, said it was too much trouble to put Miss Du Plessis to; but his objections were overruled. Soon a beatific vision came once more on the scene, and Wordsworth was enthroned as the king of poets. Miss Halbert and Mr. Perrowne were in the garden, and the clergyman had a rose in his button hole which he had not plucked himself. If he had not been in holy orders, he would have thought Miss Fanny was awfully jolly. Then he said to himself, that holy orders don't hinder a man being a man, and Miss Fanny was, really was, awfully jolly, and boarding in the houses of uncultivated farmers was an awful bore. But this was nothing to what was going on in the studiously avoided work room. The lawyer's hands were being washed, because a voice from an arch-looking face said that he was a big baby, and didn't know how to wash himself. It was quite a big baby in size and aspect that was soaped and glycerined, and had some other stuff rubbed into his hands by other pretty hands, one of which wore the victim's ring. Corry felt that he could stand it, even to the putting on of the minister's gloves. When she had finished her work, the hospital nurse said, "that silly little Marjorie, angry because Cecile would not allow her to read fairy stories to Mr. Wilkinson, surrendered you to me."

"O Marjorie, my darlin', and would you throw your lovely self away on a poor, stupid, worthless thing like me?"