he leaf, Cristel."

"Father has got it. I thought he was asleep in the armchair. He snatched
it out of my hand. It isn't worth reading."

She turned pale, nevertheless, when she replied in those terms. I could
see that I was disturbing her, when I asked if she remembered what the
Cur had written. But our position was far too serious to be trifled with.
"I suppose he threatened you?" I said, trying to lead her on. "What did
he say?"

"He said, if any attempt was made to remove me out of his reach, after
what had happened that evening, my father would find him on the watch day
and night, and would regret it to the end of his life. The wretch thinks
me cruel enough to have told my father of the horrors we went through!
You know that he has dismissed his poor old servant? Was I wrong in
advising Gloody to go to you?"

"You were quite right. He is at my house--and I should like to keep him
at Trimley Deen; but I am afraid he and the other servants might not get
on well together?"

"Will you let him come here?"

She spoke earnestly; reminding me that I had thought it wrong to leave
her father, at his age, without someone to help him.

"If an accident separated me from him," she went on, "he would be left
alone in this wretched place."

"What accident are you thinking of?" I asked. "Is there something going
on, Cristel, that I don't know of?"

Had I startled her? or had I offended her?

"Can we tell what may or may not happen to us, in the time to come?" she
asked abruptly. "I don't like to think of my father being left without a
creature to take care of him. Gloody is so good and so true; and they
always get on well together. If you have nothing better in view for
him--?"

"My dear, I have nothing half so good in view; and Gloody, I am sure,
will think so too." I privately resolved to insure a favorable reception
for the poor fellow, by making him the miller's partner. Bank notes in
Toller's pocket! What a place reserved for Gloody in Toller's estimation!

But I confess that Cristel's allusion to a possible accident rather
oppressed my mind, situated as we were at that time. What we talked of
next has slipped from my memory. I only recollect that she made an excuse
to go back to her room, and that nothing I could say or do availed to
restore her customary cheerfulness.

As the twilight was beginning to fade, we heard the sound of a carriage.
The new man had arrived in a fly from the station. Before bedtime, he