n. He would not have come back to his
father had he not been driven by his own vices to live with the
swine." Then, seeing the tears coming down the poor mother's cheeks,
he added in a kinder voice, "Perhaps it may be all well as it is. We
will hope so at least, and to-morrow I will come down and see him.
You need not tell him that I am coming, unless he should ask where
you have been." Then Mrs. Brattle took her leave, and the parson
finished his sermon.

That afternoon he drove his wife across the county to visit certain
friends at Charlicoats, and, both going and coming, could not keep
himself from talking about the Brattles. In the first place, he
thought that Gilmore was wrong not to complete the work himself.

"Of course he'll see that the money is spent and all that, and no
doubt in this way he may get the job done twenty or thirty pounds
cheaper; but the Brattles have not interest enough in the place to
justify it."

"I suppose the old man liked it best so."

"The old man shouldn't have been allowed to have his way. I am in an
awful state of alarm about Sam. Much as I like him,--or at any rate
did like him,--I fear he is going, or perhaps has gone, to the dogs.
That those two men were housebreakers is as certain as that you sit
there; and I cannot doubt but that he has been with them over at
Lavington or Devizes, or somewhere in that country."

"But he may, perhaps, never have joined them in anything of that
kind."

"A man is known by his companions. I would not have believed it if
I had not found him with the men, and traced him and them about the
county together. You see that this fellow whom they call the Grinder
was certainly the man I struck. I tracked him to Lavington, and there
he was complaining of being sore all over his body. I don't wonder
that he was sore. He must be made like a horse to be no worse than
sore. Well, then, that man and Sam were certainly in our garden
together."

"Give him a chance, Frank."

"Of course, I will give him a chance. I will give him the very best
chance I can. I would do anything to save him,--but I can't help
knowing what I know."

He had made very little to his wife of the danger of the Vicarage
being robbed, but he could not but feel that there was danger.
His wife had brought with her, among other plenishing for their
household, a considerable amount of handsome plate, more than is,
perhaps, generally to be found in country parsonages, and no doubt
this f