ligious feeling, I dread nothing so much as his father finding him
deficient in manliness or strength of character.'

CHAPTER VIII.

A TRUANT DISPOSITION.

Gathering up each broken thread.
WHYTEHEAD.

'Tom Madison is come back,' said the Vicar, as he sat beside
Fitzjocelyn's couch, a day or two after Lord Ormersfield had gone to
London.

'Come back--where has he been?' exclaimed Louis.

'There!' said the Vicar, with a gesture of dismay; 'I forgot that you
were to hear nothing of it! However, I should think you were well
enough to support the communication.'

'What is it?' cried Louis, the blood rushing into his cheeks so
suddenly, that Mr. Holdsworth felt guilty of having disregarded the
precautions that he had fancied exaggerated by the fond aunt. 'Poor
fellow--he has not--' but, checking himself, he added, 'I am
particularly anxious to hear of him.'

'I wish there were anything more gratifying to tell you; but he took
the opportunity of the height of your illness to run away from his
place, and has just been passed home to his parish. After all your
pains, it is very mortifying, but--'

'Pains! Don't you know how I neglected him latterly!' said Louis.
'Poor fellow--then--' but he stopped himself again, and added, 'You
heard nothing of the grounds?'

'They were not difficult to find,' said Mr. Holdsworth. 'It is the old
story. He was, as Mrs. Smith told me, 'a great trial'--more and more
disposed to be saucy and disobedient, taking up with the most
good-for-nothing boys in the town, haunting those Chartist lectures,
and never coming home in proper time at night. The very last evening,
he had come in at eleven o'clock, and when his master rebuked him, came
out with something about the rights of man. He was sent to Little
Northwold, about the middle of the day, to carry home some
silver-handled knives of Mr. Calcott's, and returned no more. Smith
fancied, at first, that he had made off with the plate, and set the
police after him, but that proved to be an overhasty measure, for the
parcel had been safely left. However, Miss Faithfull's servant found
him frightening Mrs. Frost's poor little kitchen-maid into fits, and
the next day James Frost detected him lurking suspiciously about the
garden here, and set Warren to warn him off--'

Louis gave a kind of groan, and struck his hand against the couch in
despair, then said, anxiously, 'What then?'

'No more was