Deerbrook

however, that it would be as well to keep Charles at home, in case, as was possible, of a messenger being wanted. He himself would soon be back.

Charles was called up into the drawing-room, and questioned. Never before having been of so much importance, he was very grand in his statements, and made the most of all he had to say. Still, however, it was a story which no telling could have made other than an unpleasant one. Some of the people who had come in from the country had pitchforks. Two or three of the shopkeepers had put up their shutters.

Many strangers were in the churchyard, peeping about the new graves: and others had set scouts on the road, to give notice when master was coming. Mrs Plumstead was very busy scolding the people all round; but it did not do any good, for they only laughed at her.

"You may go, Charles; but do not set foot out of the house till you are bid," said Hester, when she found the boy had told all he knew, and perhaps something more. Morris left the room with him, in order to keep her eye upon him.

"Oh, Margaret, this is very terrible!" said Hester.

"Most disagreeable. We must allow something for Charles's way of telling the story. But yet--is there anything we can do, Hester?"

"Mr Grey will surely be here, presently. Do not you think so?"

"Either he or Mr Rowland, no doubt."

"Dr Levitt is a magistrate: but this is Saturday, and he is so deep in his sermon, he could not be made to understand and believe till it would be too late.--Do you go up to the attic, Margaret, and I will keep the hall door. I shall hear his horse sooner than any one, and I shall stand ready to open to him in an instant. Hark now!"

It was only the boy with the post-bags, trotting slowly to Mrs Plumstead's, amusing himself by the way with observations on the unusual animation of Deerbrook.

"It is too soon yet, by half an hour," said Margaret. "He cannot possibly be here for this half-hour, I think. Do not wear yourself out with standing in the hall so long. I must just say one thing, love, I fear all kinds of danger less for Edward than for almost any one else in the world: he does always what is most simple and right; and I think he could melt anybody's heart if he tried."

"Thank you," said Hester, gratefully. "I agree and trust with you: but what hearts have these people? or, how can you get at them, through such heads? But yet he will triumph, I feel."

When Margaret went up-stairs to the attic window, Hester moved a chair into the hall, softly opened the window a little, to facilitate her hearing whatever passed outside, and took her seat by it, listening intently. There was soon but too much to listen to. Shuffling feet multiplied about the door; and some of the grumbling voices seemed to come from men who had stationed themselves on the steps. Hester rose, and, with the utmost care to avoid noise, put up the chain of the house door. While she was doing this, Morris came from the kitchen, for the same purpose. She feared there was an intention to surround the house: she wished her master would keep away, for a few hours at least; she could not think where all the gentlemen of the place were, that they did not come and see after her young ladies. Before the words were uttered, there was a loud rap at the door. Morris made her mistress keep back, while she found out who it was, before letting down the chain. Hester knew it was not her husband's knock; and it turned out to be Mr Grey's.

Margaret came flying down, and they all exclaimed how glad they were to see him.

"I wish I could do you any good," said he; "but this is really a sad business, my dears."

"Have you heard anything, sir?"

"Nothing about your husband. Enderby bade me tell you that he is gone out to meet him, and to stir up Sir William Hunter, who may be said to be the cause of all this, inasmuch as he never attempted to stop the discontent when he might. But that unlucky vote, my dear, that was much to be deplored."

"No use casting that up now, surely," observed Morris.

"Yes, Morris, there is," said her mistress; "it gives me an opportunity of saying that I glory in the vote; and I would have my husband give it again to-day, if he had to pass through yonder crowd to go up to the poll."

"My dear," remonstrated Mr Grey, "be prudent. Do not urge your husband on into danger: he has quite enthusiasm enough without; and you see what comes of it.--But I am here to say that my wife hopes you and Margaret will retire to our house, if you can get round without bringing any of these troublesome people with you. We think you might slip out from the surgery, and along the lane, and through the Rowlands' garden door, and over the hedge which they tell me you managed to climb one day lately for pleasure. By this way, you might reach our house without any one being the wiser."

"On no account whatever," said Hester. "I shall not leave home, under any circumstances."

"You are very kind," said Margaret; "but we are expecting my brother every moment."

"But he will follow you by the same road."

Both wife and sister were sure he would do no such thing. They thought the kindest thing Mr Grey could do would be to go out the back way, and see that the constable was kept up to his duty. He promised to do so; and that he would speak to Dr Levitt, to have some of Grey and Rowlands men sworn in as special constables, if such a measure should appear to be desirable.

"I do not know how to believe all this now," said Margaret; "it seems so causeless and ridiculous! In Birmingham we could never have given credit to the story of such a riot about nothing."

Morris was not sure of this. In large towns there were riots sometimes for very small matters, or on account of entire mistakes. She had always heard that one of the worst things about living in a village is, that when the people once get a wrong idea into their heads, there is no getting it out again; and that they will even be violent upon it against all reason; but such things she knew to happen occasionally in towns.

Another knock. It was Mr Rowland, and Hester's heart turned sick at there being no news of her husband. Mr Rowland had every expectation, of course, that Mr Hope would be quite safe, and that this would turn out a disturbance of very slight consequence: but he would just ask whether it would not be advisable to close the window-shutters. If stones should find their way into the parlours, it might be disagreeable to the ladies.--There was no doubt of that: but would not closing the shutters be a hint to the people outside to throw stones?--Well, perhaps so. He only thought he would offer the suggestion, and see if he could be of any service to the ladies.

"Morris, go up to the attic and watch; and Margaret, do you stay here.

Yes, Mr Rowland," said Hester, fixing her glorious eyes full on him; "you can be of service to us, if my husband outlives this day. You ought to pray that he may; for if not, it is your wife who has murdered him."

Mr Rowland turned as pale as ashes.

"We know well that you have no share in all this injury: we believe that you respect my husband, and have friendly feelings towards us all. I will spare you what I might say--what Mrs Rowland should sink to the earth to hear, if she were standing where you stand. I look upon you as no enemy--" "You do me only justice," said Mr Rowland, leaning upon the chair which Hester had brought for herself.

"I wish to do you justice; and therefore I warn you that if you do not procure complete protection for my husband--not only for this day--but for the future;--if you do not cause your wife to retract her slanders--" "Stop, Mrs Hope! this is going too far," said Mr Rowland, drawing himself up, and putting on an air of offended dignity.

"It is not going too far. You cannot, you dare not, pretend to be offended with what I say, when you know that my noble husband has been injured in his character and his prospects, attacked in his domestic peace, and now exposed to peril of his life, by the falsehoods your wife has told. I tell you that we do not impute her crimes to you. If this is justice, you will prove it by doing your full duty to my husband. If you decline any part of this duty--if you countenance her slanders--if you shrink from my husband's side in whatever we may have to go through--if you do not either compel your wife to do us right, or do it yourself in opposition to her--you are her partner in guilt, as well as in life and lot."

"Consider what a situation you place me in!--But what would you have me do?"

"I would have you see that every false charge she has brought is retracted--every vile insinuation recanted. You must make her say everywhere that my husband has not stolen dead bodies; that he is not a plotter against the peace and order of society; that he has not poisoned a child by mistake, or cut off a sound limb for the sake of practice and amusement. Your wife has said these things, and you know it; and you must make her contradict them all."

"Consider what a situation you place me in!" said Mr Rowland again.

"Be generous, Hester!" said Margaret.

"Do not trample on a wretched man!" cried Mr Rowland, covering his face with his hands.

"`Consider!' `Be generous!'" exclaimed Hester in a softened tone. "I might well say, Consider what a situation my husband is placed in! and that I must see justice done to him before I can be generous to others; but I have such a husband that I can afford to spare the wretched, and be generous to the humbled. Go now and do _your_ duty by us: and the next time you hear your wife say that we do not love and are not happy, tell her that if we forbear to crush her, it is because we are too strong for her--too strong in heart, however weak in fortunes:--because we are strong in a peace which she cannot poison, and a love which she will never understand."

Even at a moment like this, and while feeling that she could not have said the things that Hester said, Margaret's eyes swam in tears of joy.

Here was her sister, in a moment of that high excitement when nothing but truth ventures upon utterance, acknowledging herself blessed in peace which could not be poisoned, and love which the vile could not understand. The day, whatever might be its events, was worth enduring for this.

Mr Rowland walked once or twice up and down the hall, wiped his brows, and then, evidently unable to endure Hester's presence, said he would let himself out, and there await Mr Hope's arrival, or anything else that might occur.

Oh! would he ever come? It seemed to Hester like a week since she had given him his umbrella, and seen him ride away.

Hark! Surely this must be--it certainly was his horse this time. Yes-- there was Morris calling from the stairs that her master was fighting his way down the street! There was Charles giving notice that the crowd was running round from the back to the front of the house! There was the noise among the people outside, the groaning, the cries!

"Now, ma'am!" said Morris, breathless with the haste she had made down stairs. Morris supposed her mistress would softly let down the chain, open the door just wide enough for Hope to slip in, and shut, bolt, and chain it again. This was what Hester had intended; but her mood was changed. She bade the servants all step out of sight, and then threw the door wide open, going forth herself upon the steps. The people had closed round Hope's horse; but Philip was pushing his in between the mob and their object, and riding round and round him with a sort of ludicrous gravity, which lowered the tone of the whole affair to Margaret's mind, and gave her great relief. Mr Rowland was shaking hands with Hope with one hand, and holding the bridle of the uneasy horse with the other. Hope himself was bespattered with mud from head to foot, and his umbrella was broken to pieces. He nodded cheerfully to Hester when she threw open the door. When she held out her hand to him with a smile as he ascended the steps, the noise of the crowd was suddenly hushed. They understood rather more of what they saw than of anything that could be said to them. They allowed Charles to come out, and lead the horse away round the corner to the stable. They stood stock-still, gaping and staring, while Hope invited Mr Rowland in, and Mr Rowland declined entering; while that gentleman shook hands with the ladies, spoke with Mr Enderby, mounted Mr Enderby's horse, and rode off. They saw Philip turn slowly into the house with the family party, and the door closed, before they thought of giving another groan.

"Well, love!" said Hester, looking anxiously at her husband.

"You made good battle," said Philip.

"Yes, I had a pretty hard fight of it, from the toll-bar hither," said Hope, stretching vigorously. "They wrenched my whip out of my hand-- five hands to one; but then I had my umbrella. I broke it to pieces with rapping their knuckles."

"Which are as hard as their pates," observed Philip. "What are we to do next?"

"If they do not disperse presently, I will go and speak to them; but I dare say they have had enough of the show for to-day: Mrs Plumstead must have satisfied them with oratory. That poor woman's face and voice will haunt me when I have forgotten all the rest. One had almost rather have her against one, than that such screaming should be on one's behalf. Now, my love, how has the morning gone with you?"

"Very pleasantly, I would answer for it from her looks," said Philip.

And Hester's face was certainly full of the beauty of happiness.

"Thank God, the morning is over! That is all I have to say about it," replied she.

"Surely those people outside are growing more noisy!" observed Margaret.

"I must change my clothes, in case of its being necessary to speak to them," said Hope. "I look too like a victim at present."

While he and Hester were out of the room, Philip told Margaret how her brother had been treated at the almshouses. He had narrowly escaped being pulled from his horse and thrown into the pond. He had been followed half-way to Deerbrook by a crowd, throwing stones and shrieking; and just when he had got beyond their reach, he had met Philip, and learned that he had the same thing to go through, at the other extremity of his journey. Finding that both his doors were surrounded, he had judged it best to make for the front, coming home as nearly as possible in his usual manner. He had kept his temper admirably, joking with his detainers, while dealing his blows upon their hands.

"Where will all this end?" cried Margaret.

"With some going to dinner, and others to supper, I imagine," replied Philip, stepping to the window. "From what I see, that seems likely to be the upshot; for here is Sir William Hunter talking to the people. I had rather he should do it than Hope; and, Margaret, I had rather set my mischievous sister to do it than either. This uproar is all of her making, I am afraid."

"Hester has been telling Mr Rowland so, this morning."

"I am glad of it. He must help me to work upon her fears, if there is nothing better left to operate upon."

"You will not succeed," said Margaret. "Your sister is as strong a heroine in one direction as mine is in another."

"She shall yield, however. She may be thankful that she is not here to-day. If she was, I would have her out upon the steps, and make her retract everything; and if she should not be able to speak, I would stand by her and say it for her."

"Oh, Philip! what a horrible idea!"

"Not half so horrible as the mischief she has done. Why, Margaret, if you were one-tenth part as guilty as Priscilla is, I should require you to make reparation."

"Indeed, I hope you would: or rather, that--" "But do not let us conjure up such dreadful images, my Margaret. You never wronged any one, and you never will."

"Edward never did, I am sure," said Margaret.

"Not even by poisoning children, nor cutting off limbs for sport? Are you quite sure, love? What is Sir William doing here, with only his groom? He and the people look in high good-humour with each other, with all this shaking of hands, and nodding and laughing. I cannot conceive what he can be saying to them, for there are not three faces among the whole array that look as if they belonged to rational creatures."

"Never mind," said Margaret. "If what he says sends them away, I care for nothing else about it."

"Oh, but I do. One would like to be favoured with a specimen of this kind of rural oratory. I ought to benefit by all the oratory that comes in my way, you know: so I shall just open the window an inch or two, now he is drawing hitherward, and take a lesson."

It seemed as if Sir William Hunter desired that his powers of persuasion should be expended on none but the immediate objects of them: for whatever he said was spoken as he bent from his horse, and with the air of a mystery. Many a plump red face was thrust close up to his--many a pair of round staring eyes was puckered up with mirth as he spoke: the teamster in his olive-coloured smock, the hedger in his shirt-sleeves, and the little bumpkins who had snatched a holiday from scaring the crows, all seemed, by their delight, to be capable of entering into the baronet's method of argumentation. All this stimulated Philip's curiosity to learn what the speechifying tended to. He could catch only a few words, and those were about "a new man,"--"teach him to take himself off,"--"all bad things come to an end,"--"new state of things, soon." Philip was afraid there was treachery here. Margaret had no other expectation from the man--the tyrannical politician, who bore a grudge against a neighbour for having used his constitutional liberty according to his conscience.

Some spectacle now drew the attention of the crowd another way. It was Lady Hunter, in her chariot and greys, statelily pacing through the village. She had heard that there was some commotion in Deerbrook; and, as sights are rare in the country, she thought she would venture to come to the village to shop, rather than wait for Sir William's account of the affair in the evening, over their wine and oranges, and before he dropped off into his nap. She rightly confided in the people, that they would respect her chariot and greys, and allow her to pass amidst them in safety and honour. She had never seen a person mobbed. Here was a good opportunity. It was even possible that she might catch a glimpse of the ladies in their terrors. At all events, she should be a great person, and see and hear a great deal: so she would go. Orders were given that she should be driven quickly up to the milestone beyond the toll-bar, and then very slowly through Deerbrook to Mrs Howell's. Her servants were prompt, for they, too, longed to see what was going forward; and thus they arrived, finding a nice little mob ready-made to their expectations, and no cause of regret but that they arrived too late to see Mr Hope get home. There were no ladies in terror within sight: but then there was the affecting spectacle of Sir William's popularity. In full view of all the mob, Lady Hunter put a corner of her embroidered handkerchief to each eye, on witnessing the affection of his neighbours to her husband, shown by the final shaking of hands which was now gone through. Sir William then rode slowly up to the carriage-door, followed by his groom, who touched his hat. Orders were given to drive on; and then Lady Hunter's servants touched their hats.

The carriage resumed its slow motion, and Sir William rode beside it, his hand on the door, and his countenance solemn as if he was on the bench, instead of on horseback. The great blessing of the arrangement was that everybody followed. Lady Hunter having come to see the mob, the mob now, in return, went to see Lady Hunter: and while they were cherishing their mutual interest, the family in the corner-house were left in peace to prosecute their dinners. Philip threw up the window which looked into the garden, and then ran down to bring Margaret some flowers to refresh her senses after the hurry of the morning. Margaret let down the chain of the hall door; and Morris laid the cloth, as she had sent Charles to sweep down the steps and pavement before the house, that all things might wear as much as possible their usual appearance.

Hester ordered up a bottle of her husband's best ale, and the servants went about with something of the air peculiar to a day of frolic.

"Dear heart! Lady Hunter! Can it be your ladyship?" exclaimed Mrs Howell, venturing to show her face at the door of her darkened shop, and to make free entrance for her most exalted customer.

"Good heavens! your ladyship! Who would have thought of seeing your ladyship here on such a day?" cried Miss Miskin.

"Where's Bob, Miss Miskin? Do, Miss Miskin, send Bob to take down the shutters:--that is, if your ladyship thinks that Sir William would recommend it. If Sir William thinks it safe,--that is my criterion."

"I hope we are all safe, now, Mrs Howell," replied the lady. "Sir William's popularity is a most fortunate circumstance for us all, and for the place at large."

"Oh dear, your ladyship! what should we be, not to estimate Sir William?

We have our faults, like other people: but really, if we did not know how to value Sir William--" "Thank Heaven!" said Miss Miskin, "we have not fallen so low as that.

Now your ladyship can see a little of our goings on--now the shutters are down: but, dear heart! your ladyship would not have wondered at our putting them up. I am sure I thought for my part, that that middle shutter never would have gone up. It stuck, your ladyship--" "Oh!" cried Mrs Howell, putting her hands before her face, as if the recollection was even now too much for her, "the middle shutter stuck-- Bob had got it awry, and jammed it between the other two, and there, nothing that Bob could do would move it! And there we heard the noise at a distance--the cries, your ladyship--and the shutter would not go up! And Miss Miskin ran out, and so did I--" "Did you really? Well, I must say I admire your courage, Mrs Howell."

"Oh, your ladyship, in a moment of desperation, you know...If anybody had seen Miss Miskin's face, I'm sure, as she tugged at the shutter--it was as red...really scarlet!"

"And I'm sure so was yours, Mrs Howell, downright crimson."

"And after all," resumed Mrs Howell, "we should never have got the shutter up, if Mr Tucker had not had the politeness to come and help us. But we are talking all this time, and perhaps your ladyship may be almost fainting with the fright. Would not your ladyship step into my parlour, and have a little drop of something? Let me have the honour--a glass of mulled port wine, or a drop of cherry-bounce. Miss Miskin--you will oblige us--the cherry-bounce, you know."

Miss Miskin received the keys from the girdle with a smile of readiness; but Lady Hunter declined refreshment. She explained that she felt more collected than she might otherwise have done, from her not having been taken by surprise. She had been partly aware, before she left the Hall, of what she should have to encounter.

"Dear heart! what courage!"

"Goodness! how brave!"

"I could not be satisfied to remain safe at the Hall, you know, when I did not know what might be happening to Sir William; so I ordered the carriage, and came. It was a very anxious ride, I assure you, Mrs Howell. But I found, when I got here, that I need not have been under any alarm for Sir William. He has made himself so beloved, that I believe we have nothing to fear for him under any circumstances. But what can we think, Mrs Howell, of those who try to create such danger?"

"What, indeed, ma'am! Any one, I'm sure, who would so much as dream of hurting a hair of Sir William's head...As I said to Miss Miskin, when Mr Tucker told us Sir William was come among them--`that's the criterion,' said I."

"As it happens, Sir William is in no danger, I believe; but no thanks to those who are at the bottom of this disturbance. It is no merit of theirs that Sir William is so popular."

"No, indeed, your ladyship. We may thank Heaven for that, not them.

But what _is_ to be done, your ladyship? I declare it is not safe to go on in this way. It makes one think of being burnt in one's bed." And all the three shuddered.

"Sir William will take the right measures, you need not doubt, Mrs Howell. Sir William looks forward--Sir William is very cautious, though, from his intrepidity, some might doubt it. The safety of Deerbrook may very well be left to Sir William."

"No doubt, your ladyship, no doubt! We should be really afraid to go to our beds, if we had not Sir William to rely on, as Miss Miskin said to me only this morning. But, dear heart! what can Sir William, or an angel from heaven do, in some sorts of dangers? If one might ask, for one's confidential satisfaction, what does Sir William think of this affair of the church-door?"

Amidst shrugs and sighs, Miss Miskin drew quite near, to hear the fate of Deerbrook revealed by Lady Hunter. But Lady Hunter did not know the facts about the church-door, on which the inquiry was based. This only showed how secret some people could be in their designs. There was no saying what Lady Hunter might think of it; it really seemed as if Deerbrook, that had had such a good character hitherto, was going to be on a level with Popish places--a place of devastation and conflagration.

Lady Hunter looked excessively grave when she heard this; and, if possible, graver than ever, when she was told that not only had a lantern been found in the churchyard with a bit of candle left in the socket, but that a piece of charred stick, full three inches long, had been picked up close by the church-door. After hearing this, Lady Hunter would not commit herself any further. She asked for some hair-pins, with a dignified and melancholy air. While she was selecting the article, she let Mrs Howell talk on about the lantern and the stick--that no one wondered about the lantern, knowing what practices went on in the churchyard when quiet people were asleep; but that the charred stick was too alarming: only that, to be sure, anybody might be aware that those who would go into churchyards for one bad purpose would be ready enough for another; and that Heaven only knew how long the churches of the land would be safe while Lowrys were sent to Parliament, and those that sent them there were all abroad. Lady Hunter sighed emphatically, whispered her desire that the hair-pins should be set down in her account, and went away, amidst deep and mournful curtseys from those whom she left behind.

Under certain circumstances, the mind becomes so rapidly possessed of an idea, is enabled to assimilate it so completely and speedily, that the possessor becomes unaware how very recently the notion was received, and deals with it as an old-established thought. This must be Lady Hunter's excuse (for no other can be found) for speaking of the plot for burning Deerbrook church as one of the signs of the times which had alarmed Sir William and herself of late. She had so digested Mrs Howell's fact by the time she had reached Mr Tucker's shop, that she thus represented the case of the charred stick to Mr Tucker without any immediate sting of conscience for telling a lie. She felt rather uncomfortable when Mr Jones, the butcher, who had stepped in at Tucker's to discuss the event of the morning, observed, with deference, but with much decision, that he was sorry to hear Sir William was made uneasy by the circumstance of the charred stick having been found, as it seemed to him a very simple matter to account for. Several of the boys of the village--his own son John for one--had lately taken to the old sport of whirling round a lighted stick at the end of a string, to make a circle of fire in the dark. Sometimes it happened that a spark caught the string; and then the stick was apt to fly off, nobody knew where. It was an unsafe sport, certainly; and as such he had forbidden it to his son John: but there was no doubt in his mind (without defending the sport), that the stick in question had jerked itself over the churchyard wall, and had not been put there by anybody;--to say nothing of its having lain so far from the door (and in the grass, too), that it was difficult to see what could be expected to catch fire from it. Jones took up his hat from the counter, saying, that as Sir William was close at hand, he would step and tell him what he thought would ease his mind about this affair.

This movement laid open to Lady Hunter's mind the enormity of her fib: and remembering that, as far as she knew, her husband had never heard of the charred stick, she vigorously interfered to keep Mr Jones where he was, averring that Sir William had rather hear the explanation from her than from any person actually resident in Deerbrook. He had his reasons, and she must insist. Mr Jones bowed; her alarm ceased, and her compunction gradually died away.

When Mr Tucker had received his orders about the fire-guard (which occasioned his whispering that there had never been so much need in Deerbrook of guards against fire as now), Lady Hunter's footman came into the shop to say that his master was in the carriage. Sir William had sent his horse home, and would return in the chariot with his lady.

She hastened away, to prevent any chat between Sir William and Mr Jones. But, once in the carriage, in all the glory of being surrounded and watched by a number of gaping clowns and shouting boys, she could not resolve to bury herself in the seclusion of the Hall, without enjoying the bustle a little longer. She therefore suddenly discovered that she wanted to order a morning cap at Miss Nares'; and the carriage drew up in state before the milliner's door. Miss Flint, whose hair had come out of curl, from her having leaned out of an upper window to watch the commotion, now flew to the glass to pull off her curl-papers; Miss Nares herself hastily drew out of drawers and cupboards the smart things which had been huddled away under the alarm about the sacking of Deerbrook; and then threw a silk handkerchief over the tray, on which stood the elder wine and toast with which she and her assistant had been comforting themselves after the panic of the morning. All the caps were tried on with mysterious melancholy, but with some haste. Sir William must not be kept long waiting: in times like these, a magistrate's moments were valuable. Sir William was reading the newspaper, in order to convey the impression that he considered the affair of this morning a trifling one; but-- "These are strange times, Miss Nares."

"Very alarming, my lady. I am sure I don't know when we shall recover from the fright. And no further back than six weeks, I had that person in, my lady, to attend Miss Flint in a sore throat. So little were we aware!"

"I am thankful enough it was not for a broken arm," observed Miss Flint, in accents of devout gratitude.

"Yes, indeed, my dear," observed Miss Nares, "it would have ruined all your prospects in life if he had done by you as he did by the Russell Taylors' nursemaid. Have you never heard that, my lady? Well! I am astonished! I find the story is in everybody's mouth. Mrs Russell Taylor's nursemaid was crossing the court, with the baby in her arms, when she tripped over the string of Master Hampden Taylor's kite. Well, my lady, she fell; and her first thought, you know, was to save the baby; so she let all her weight go on the other arm--the right--and, as you may suppose, broke it. It snapped below the elbow. The gentleman in the corner-house was sent for immediately, to set it. Now they say (you, my lady, know all about it, of course,) that there are two bones in that part of one's arm, below the elbow."

"There are so. Quite correct. There are two bones."

"Well, my lady, all the story depends upon that. The gentleman in question did set the bones; but he set them across, you see,--as it might be so." And Miss Nares arranged four pieces of whalebone on the table in the shape of a long, narrow letter X; there could not have been a better exemplification. "The consequence was, my lady, that the poor girl's hand was found, when she had got well, to be turned completely round: and, in fact, it is all but useless."

"When her hands are in her lap," observed Miss Flint, "the palm of the right lies uppermost. Ugh!"

"When she beckons the children with that hand," observed Miss Nares, "they think she means them to go further off. A girl who has to earn her bread, my lady! It is in everybody's mouth, I assure you."

"What has become of the girl?" asked Lady Hunter.

"Oh, she was got rid of--sent away--to save the credit of the gentleman in the corner-house. But these things will come out, my lady. You are aware that the Russell Taylors have for some time been employing Mr Foster, from Blickley?"

"Ah, true! I had heard of that."

With unrelaxed gravity, Lady Hunter returned to her equipage, carrying with her Miss Nares's newest cap and story.

As the carriage drew near the corner-house, the driver, as if sympathising with his lady's thoughts, made his horses go their very slowest. Lady Hunter raised herself, and leaned forward, that she might see what she could see in this dangerous abode. The spring evening sunshine was streaming in at the garden window at the back of the house; so that the party in the room was perfectly visible, in the thorough light, to any one who could surmount the obstacle of the blind. Lady Hunter saw four people sitting at dinner, and somebody was waiting on them. She could scarcely have told what it was that surprised her; but she exclaimed to Sir William-- "Good heavens! they are at dinner!"

Sir William called out angrily to the coachman to drive faster, and asked whether he meant to keep everybody out till midnight.

The Hopes were far less moved by seeing the baronet and his lady driving by, than the baronet and his lady were by seeing the Hopes dining. They had not the slightest objection to the great folks from the Hall deriving all the excitement and amusement they could from an airing through the village; and they were happily ignorant of the most atrocious stories about Hope which were now circulating from mouth to mouth, all round Deerbrook.

It was not long, however, before they found that they had been indebted to the great folks from the Hall for a certain degree of protection, partly from the equipage having drawn off the attention of some of the idlers, and partly from the people having been unwilling to indulge all their anger and impertinence in the presence of a magistrate. Scarcely half an hour had elapsed after the sound of the carriage wheels had died away, before a face was seen surmounting the blind of the windows towards the street. Presently another appeared, and another. Men below were hoisting up boys, to make grimaces at the family, and see what was going on. The shutters were closed rather earlier than usual. Philip went out to make a survey. He and Mr Grey soon returned, to advise that the ladies should quit the house, and that a guard should enter it.