and not to back-reckon, unless you force him to do
so."

"This is a conspiracy, Moser."

"Conspiracy! Eh? Ugly word, Mr. Sandal. An actionable word, I may say."

"It is a conspiracy. You shall hear from me through some respectable
lawyer."

"In the mean time, Mr. Sandal, I have taken, as you will see, the proper
legal steps to prevent you wasting any more of the Sandal revenues.
Every shilling you touch now, you will be held responsible for. Also,"
and he laid another paper down, "you are hereby restrained from
removing, injuring, or in any way changing, or disposing of, the present
furniture of the Seat. The squire insists specially on this direction,
and he kindly allows you seven days to remove your private effects. A
very reasonable gentleman is Squire Sandal."

Without further courtesies they parted; and the deposed squire locked
the room-door, lifted the various documents, and read them with every
sense he had. Then he went to Sophia; and at that hour he was almost
angry with her, although he could not have told how, or why, such a
feeling existed. When he opened the door of the parlor, her first words
were a worry over the non-arrival, by mail, of some floss-silks,
needful in the bird's-nest she was working for a fire-screen.

"They have not come, Julius," she cried, with a face full of inquiry and
annoyance.

"They? Who?"

"The flosses for my bird's-nest. The eggs must be in white floss."

"The bird's nest can go to Jericho, or Calcutta, or into the fire. We
are ordered to leave Seat-Sandal in seven days."

"I would not be so absurd, Julius, so unfeeling, so ungentlemanly."

"Well, then, my soul," and he bowed with elaborate grace, "Stephen
Latrigg, squire of Sandal-Side, orders us to leave in seven days. Can
you be ready?"

She looked into the suave, mocking, inscrutable face, shrugged her
shoulders, and began to count her stitches. Julius had many varieties of
ill-humor. She regarded this statement only as a new phase of his
temper; but he soon undeceived her. With a pitiless exactness he went
over his position, and, in doing so, made the hopelessness of his case
as clear to himself as it was to others. And yet he was determined not
to yield without a struggle; though, apart from the income of Sandal,
which he could not reach, he had little money and no credit.

The story, with all its romance of attachment and its long trial of
faithful secrecy, touched the prejudices and the sympathies of ev