believe that I convinced him. But he only shrugged his shoulders, and observed coldly that whether my brother had been murdered or not was a matter which in no way affected the terms he was about to dictate to me as the price of his silence. It might be a satisfaction to my own conscience to believe that the affair had been an accident: perhaps it was so, though he must say the circumstances were very suspicious -so suspicious, indeed, that there was no doubt as to the view which the law would take of the case, if once it should have cognisance of it. It was for our common interest, however, he said, that the matter should be kept secret, and he could keep a secret, if it was made worth his while. Thus he went on, as we stood together in the parlour that dreadful night, while I searched my mind in vain for schemes of safety. He had, in fact, even a stronger hold on me than he supposed. If once I was denounced, even though the law should acquit me, a greater punishment than the worst it could have inflicted would be mine, since I knew you would never more abide with one who had shed Richard's blood. In my utter hopelessness and despair, I even stooped to the humiliation of appealing to the villain's mercy-the mercy of Dennis Blake! Whereupon, he plainly told me that he had no such commodity for any man whose interests were antagonistic to his own, but least of all for me. There was no love lost, said he, between him and any of his fellow-creatures, but that he hated one man worse than all the rest, and that man was John Milbank. When that mark on his forehead-they had told him in the hospital he must needs carry it to his grave-was worn out, he might perhaps forgive the hand that caused it, but not till then ; so I had best leave mercy out of the question. Then he proceeded to state the price of his silence and of my ransom; of which, let it suffice to say, since he will never profit by it by one farthing, that it was but little short of utter

ruin.

"During all this time, I had still the thought that he would leave me before daylight, when I might secretly put away the evidence of that seeming crime, upon which alone he based his power over me. Cruel, therefore, as his terms were, I professed to accept them, and looked to see him thereupon depart. "But, my friend, we have not got this down in your handwriting!' said he grimly.

"What matters!' said I. 'It is not difficult to remember what you have left to me, and, therefore, what you have exacted; and to put such an agreement on paper, though more perilous, would not be more binding than in words.'

"That is true; but I was not referring to the agreement at all, which, as you say, is safe enough. What I want is an acknowledgment of the circumstance that has happened tonight-the finding of your brother's body in the cellar, and so on. You may explain how it came there as you please.'

"Then my heart sank within me, indeed-for what he demanded was, in fact, nothing less than a confession; and, if once possessed of that, he was my master, indeed, for ever! Then suddenly a thought, which at the time seemed to have winged its way from Heaven itself, flashed on my brain. In obedience to his request, I got out some paper from my desk, but contrived (and my agitation and excitement must have rendered the accident natural enough) to upset the ink.

"You must have ink elsewhere,' said he sternly.

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"Yes,' said I, 'there is some upstairs: I will fetch it.'

"I resolved to write out what he required in the ink invented by your father, and trust to its virtues to make me once more a free man. I came up to your room, as you remember, and you gave me a bottle. What you must have thought of such a demand, at such a time, I cannot guess; my whole mind was intent on getting that villain from under our roof, and, meanwhile, could apply itself to nothing else. I wrote out what he wanted; and when he had read it over

carefully, he nodded approval, and put it in his pocket. He asked me for fifty pounds-just as one asks the banker with whom one has a balance to cash a cheque—and saying that that would do for the next ten days, when he would call again, and when I must be ready with a good lump sum, he left me."

CHAPTER XL.

NEW YEAR'S EVE.

"I CREPT up to my room, I know not how, and lay down by your side, wife, but feeling as though half the world were already between us. It was too near the break of dawn to admit of my removing the cause of my ruin from where it lay; and once more it ceaselessly presented itself before my eyes, not as I had seen it, but even in more hideous shape-endowed with a ghastly life, and pointing to me with outstretched arm, as though denouncing me-as, indeed, it had done-as a murderer! Your proposal that I should keep my room for a time, by reason of the change in my appearance, was not displeasing to me; for I felt that every face that looked on mine must read my secret in it, and even your own dear presence was insupportable to me. I longed for night to come, that I might go about the dreadful work that I had set myself to do. As to telling you one syllable of what had happened, that was impossible; to have mentioned Dennis Blake would at once, I knew, have turned your thoughts to Richard, and then

-I did not dare to think what then! I swear to you that, sooner than confront the idea of losing you, I preferred that my mind should keep company with that other haunting image-my dead brother. Oh, how could that wise writer whom we once read together have said, 'There are possibilities which our minds shrink from too completely for us to fear them!' I shrank, indeed, from this one, but it was because

I feared it, as the wicked on their deathbed fear the grave. The day came to its end at last; and in the night-while you slept fast, outworn, I doubt not, with anxieties and fears, yet spared as yet from knowing what I knew-I rose, and went out to the tool-house, and, by the passage that Blake had made, into the cellar. Had ever man, I wonder, since the earth was made, so dreadful a task to do in it as I had? Yet I did it. I took Richard's body away-what horrors are hidden beneath those common words !—and buried it—no matter where: where it will not be found till earth gives up its dead. That done, I had some hopes of safety, and could think a little, and with calmness. If only the ink in which I had written my own accusation should perform its office, there was now but Blake's bare word to hurt me-his against mine: the word of a cheat and scoundrel against an honest man's. In that appalling hour, a tale of which you had once spoken to me recurred to my mind for nothing that you ever said have I forgottenrespecting one who, being made captive by a savage tribe, was doomed to death, unless, as he had foretold, the Great Spirit should interfere on his behalf with some prodigy upon the fatal day. An eclipse had been predicted for that date in a penny almanac which he chanced to have about him, and to that event-whether calculated by science, or merely the haphazard guess of some empiric, he knew not-the prisoner had to trust. As it happened, the thing took place, and he was saved. And this was now my case, except that I had better reason to believe in the seeming miracle. In ten days' time, when that villain came again, he might find me free.

"I need not tell you, Maggie, how this poor hope was put to flight by your own innocent hands: how you tracked me in the garden, out of pure love and duty-as I went to lay my spade and pickaxe by, and then confronted me in the house-still for my good, sweetheart!-with the charge of compassing the death of Dennis Blake. I had no thought of

Y