s in his study, and walked about the room, restlessly musing on the
same subject. The parlour-maid entered.

'Can young Mr. Springrove from London see you to-night, sir?'

'Young Mr. Springrove?' said the rector, surprised.

'Yes, sir.'

'Yes, of course he can see me. Tell him to come in.'

Edward came so impatiently into the room, as to show that the few short
moments his announcement had occupied had been irksome to him. He stood
in the doorway with the same black bag in his hand, and the same old
gray cloak on his shoulders, that he had worn fifteen months earlier
when returning on the night of the fire. This appearance of his conveyed
a true impression; he had become a stagnant man. But he was excited now.

'I have this moment come from London,' he said, as the door was closed
behind him.

The prophetic insight, which so strangely accompanies critical
experiences, prompted Mr. Raunham's reply.

'About the Grayes and Manston?'

'Yes. That woman is not Mrs. Manston.'

'Prove it.'

'I can prove that she is somebody else--that her name is Anne Seaway.'

'And are their suspicions true indeed!'

'And I can do what's more to the purpose at present.'

'Suggest Manston's motive?'

'Only suggest it, remember. But my assumption fits so perfectly with the
facts that have been secretly unearthed and conveyed to me, that I can
hardly conceive of another.'

There was in Edward's bearing that entire unconsciousness of himself
which, natural to wild animals, only prevails in a sensitive man at
moments of extreme intentness. The rector saw that he had no trivial
story to communicate, whatever the story was.

'Sit down,' said Mr. Raunham. 'My mind has been on the stretch all the
evening to form the slightest guess at such an object, and all to no
purpose--entirely to no purpose. Have you said anything to Owen Graye?'

'Nothing--nor to anybody. I could not trust to the effect a letter might
have upon yourself, either; the intricacy of the case brings me to this
interview.'

Whilst Springrove had been speaking the two had sat down together. The
conversation, hitherto distinct to every corner of the room, was carried
on now in tones so low as to be scarcely audible to the interlocutors,
and in phrases which hesitated to complete themselves. Three-quarters
of an hour passed. Then Edward arose, came out of the rector's study and
again flung his cloak around him. Instead of going thence homeward,
he went first to the