or
looked so entreating and wistful that she could hardly find in her heart
to refuse her. A bright thought struck her.

"Here is pen and paper, my dear. Could you not write the questions you
wanted to ask? and he'll just jot down the answers upon the same piece of
paper. I'll send it in by Jerry. He has got friends to dinner with him,
you see."

Ellinor yielded. She sat, resting her weary head on her hand, and
wondering what were the questions which would have come so readily to her
tongue could she have been face to face with him. As it was, she only
wrote this:

"How early can I see you to-morrow morning? Will you take all the
necessary steps for my going to Dixon as soon as possible? Could I be
admitted to him to-night?"

The pencilled answers were:

"Eight o'clock. Yes. No."

"I suppose he knows best," said Ellinor, sighing, as she read the last
word. "But it seems wicked in me to be going to bed--and he so near, in
prison."

When she rose up and stood, she felt the former dizziness return, and
that reconciled her to seeking rest before she entered upon the duties
which were becoming clearer before her, now that she knew all and was on
the scene of action. Mrs. Johnson brought her white-wine whey instead of
the tea she had asked for; and perhaps it was owing to this that she
slept so soundly.

CHAPTER XV.

When Ellinor awoke the clear light of dawn was fully in the room. She
could not remember where she was; for so many mornings she had wakened up
in strange places that it took her several minutes before she could make
out the geographical whereabouts of the heavy blue moreen curtains, the
print of the lord-lieutenant of the county on the wall, and all the
handsome ponderous mahogany furniture that stuffed up the room. As soon
as full memory came into her mind, she started up; nor did she go to bed
again, although she saw by her watch on the dressing-table that it was
not yet six o'clock. She dressed herself with the dainty completeness so
habitual to her that it had become an unconscious habit, and then--the
instinct was irrepressible--she put on her bonnet and shawl, and went
down, past the servant on her knees cleaning the doorstep, out into the
fresh open air; and so she found her way down the High Street to
Hellingford Castle, the building in which the courts of assize were
held--the prison in which Dixon lay condemned to die. She almost knew
she could not see him; yet it s