she reproached herself, she had been convinced of
it. She would not acknowledge even to herself that she doubted him; and
all her words, all her thoughts even, expressed a firm belief in his
innocence; but a ghastly terror had lurked in some hidden recess of her
consciousness. It haunted her soul like a mysterious shadow which there
was no bodily shape to explain. The fear had caught her, as though with
material hands, when first the news of his arrest was brought to Court
Leys by Robert Boulger, and again at her father's flat in Shaftesbury
Avenue, when she saw a secret shame cowering behind the good-humoured
flippancy of his smile. Notwithstanding his charm of manner and the
tenderness of his affection for his children, she had known that he was
a liar and a rascal. She hated him.

But when Lucy saw him, still with the hunted look that Dick had noticed
at the trial, so changed from when last they had met, her anger melted
away, and she felt only pity. She reproached herself bitterly. How could
she be so heartless when he was suffering? At first he could not speak.
He looked from one to the other of his children silently, with appealing
eyes; and he saw the utter wretchedness which was on George's face.
George was ashamed to look at him and kept his eyes averted. Fred
Allerton was suddenly grown old and bent; his poor face was sunken, and
the skin had an ashy look like that of a dying man. He had already a
cringing air, as if he must shrink away from his fellows. It was
horrible to Lucy that she was not allowed to take him in her arms. He
broke down utterly and sobbed.

'Oh, Lucy, you don't hate me?' he whispered.

'No, I've never loved you more than I love you now,' she said.

And she said it truthfully. Her conscience smote her, and she wondered
bitterly what she had left undone that might have averted this calamity.

'I didn't mean to do it,' he said, brokenly.

Lucy looked at his poor, wearied eyes. It seemed very cruel that she
might not kiss them.

'I'd have paid her everything if she'd only have given me time. Luck was
against me all through. I've been a bad father to both of you.'

Lucy was able to tell him that Lady Kelsey would pay the eight thousand
pounds the woman had lost. The good creature had thought of it even
before Lucy made the suggestion. At all events none of them need have on
his conscience the beggary of that unfortunate person.

'Alice was always a good soul,' said Allerton. He clung t