llo late in the
night, and had stopped suddenly in the middle of a bar.

"Well, well," said Edward John, "that beats all! Poor fellow, and me
went up to Brum to get some things all on account of 'im."

CHAPTER XXIV

ONE SUNDAY, AND AFTER

SUNDAY morning came sweet with the soft breath of golden autumn, and
Henry awoke with the breeze whispering through his open window, "Adrian
Grant is dead." For a moment it seemed that nothing else mattered, and
in a moment more the need to wash and dress dispelled that gloomy
thought.

"Poor Grant!" said Henry to himself, as he soused his face at the
wash-stand. "Poor Grant! I wonder what he thinks of life and death
to-day?" All the cynical utterances of the dead man crowded back on the
memory of the living. His contempt of the spiritual life, his jaundiced
views of humanity. It was terrible to think of a gifted man dying with
such cold thoughts in his mind. The mysterious nature of the death also
troubled Henry, and his knowledge of the man led him to suspect the use
of some drug.

But these thoughts and speculations were suppressed, if not banished, by
the pleasant routine of the rural morning and the going to morning
church. Henry found himself searching anxiously with his eyes for
Eunice Lyndon, and he was disappointed not to see her there. She was
absent owing to household duties, and a pressing visit to be made to a
sick member of Mr. Needham's flock.

At the close of the service the vicar announced that his farewell sermon
would be delivered in the evening, and extended a fatherly invitation to
his parishioners to come and hear his last words to them.

When the clang of the evening bell shook the drowsy air of the village,
it evoked an unusual response. Many a wheezing veteran and worn old
woman toiled their way up the hill. Never before was the little church
so full as on that peaceful autumn evening.

The entire Charles family was present, Henry sitting next to his mother;
and as he looked round upon that homely congregation, nearly every face
in which was familiar to him, the emotions of his boyhood stirred within
him again, and he felt as if all he had passed through since then was as
a troubled dream.

The slanting rays of the setting sun streamed through the western
windows as Mr. Needham slowly mounted the pulpit. Every eye was raised
to him as he stood there with his open Bible in his hand. What