his
designs.

"You had saved his life."

"He hated me none the less for that. There was only one way now to
serve either the Garths or myself, and that was to keep the man in
hand. I neither sent him away nor let him go."

"You were more than a match for him to the last," said Sim, "and you
saved me and my lass from him too. But what about Joe Garth and his
old mother? They don't look over-thankful to you, they don't."

"They think that I brought Wilson back to torment them. No words of
mine would upset the notion. I'm sorry for that, but leave such
mistakes for time to set right. And when the truth comes in such a
case it comes to some purpose."

"Aye, when it comes--_when_ it comes."

Sim spoke in an undertone, and as though to himself.

"It's long in the coming sometimes, it is."

"It seems long, truly." The dalesman had caught Sim's drift, and with
his old trick of manner, more expressive than his words, he had put
his hand on Sim's arm.

"And now there is but one chance that has made it quite worth the
while that we should have talked frankly on the subject, you and I,
and that is the chance that others may come to do what Wilson tried to
do. The authorities who issued this warrant will hardly forget that
they issued it. There was a stranger here the day after the inquest. I
think I know what he was."

Sim shuddered perceptibly.

"He went away then, but we'll see him once more, depend upon it."

"Is it true, as Wilson said, that Oliver's men are like to be taken?"

"There's a spy in every village, so they say, and blank warrants, duly
signed, in every sheriff's court, ready to be filled in with any name
that malice may suggest. These men mean that Puritanism shall be
rooted out of England. We cannot be too well prepared."

"I wish I could save you, Ralph; leastways, I wish it were myself
instead, I do."

"You thought to save me, old friend, when you went out to meet Wilson
that night three months ago. My father, too, he thought to save me
when he did what he did. You were both rash, both wrong. You could not
have helped me at all in that way. Poor father! How little he has
helped me, Heaven knows--Heaven alone knows--yet."

Ralph drew his hand across his eyes.

CHAPTER VIII. ROBBIE'S REDEMPTION.

Sim accompanied Ralph half-way down the hill when he rose to go.
Robbie Anderson could be seen hastening towards them. His mission must
be with Ralph, so Sim went back.

"I've been to Shou