as his, and everything of his was hers.
She knew more clearly now even than she had done before that she had
never loved Mr. Gilmore, and never could have loved him. And that
other doubt had been solved for her. "Do you know," she had said,
not yet an hour ago, "that I think it always will be blank." And now
every spot of the canvas was covered.

"We must go home now," she said at last.

"And tell Aunt Sarah," he replied, laughing.

"Yes, and tell Aunt Sarah;--but not to-night. I can do nothing
to-night but think about it. Oh, Walter, I am so happy!"

CHAPTER XIX.

SAM BRATTLE RETURNS HOME.

The Tuesday's magistrates' meeting had come off at Heytesbury, and
Sam Brattle had been discharged. Mr. Jones had on this occasion
indignantly demanded that his client should be set free without bail;
but to this the magistrates would not assent. The attorney attempted
to demonstrate to them that they could not require bail for the
reappearance of an accused person, when that accused person was
discharged simply because there was no evidence against him. But to
this exposition of the law Sir Thomas and his brother magistrates
would not listen. "If the other persons should at last be taken, and
Brattle should not then be forthcoming, justice would suffer," said
Sir Thomas. County magistrates, as a rule, are more conspicuous for
common sense and good instincts than for sound law; and Mr. Jones
may, perhaps, have been right in his view of the case. Nevertheless
bail was demanded, and was not forthcoming without considerable
trouble. Mr. Jay, the ironmonger at Warminster, declined. When spoken
to on the subject by Mr. Fenwick, he declared that the feeling among
the gentry was so strong against his brother-in-law, that he could
not bring himself to put himself forward. He couldn't do it for the
sake of his family. When Fenwick promised to make good the money
risk, Jay declared that the difficulty did not lie there. "There's
the Marquis, and Sir Thomas, and Squire Greenthorne, and our parson,
all say, sir, as how he shouldn't be bailed at all. And then, sir,
if one has a misfortune belonging to one, one doesn't want to flaunt
it in everybody's face, sir." And there was trouble, too, with
George Brattle from Fordingbridge. George Brattle was a prudent,
hard-headed, hard-working man, not troubled with much sentiment, and
caring very little what any one could say of him as long as his rent
was paid; but he had taken it into h