e. If everybody got their deserts, Bulstrode
might have had to say his prayers at Botany Bay."

"What do you mean?" said Mr. Hawley, thrusting his hands into his
pockets, and pushing a little forward under the archway. If Bulstrode
should turn out to be a rascal, Frank Hawley had a prophetic soul.

"I had it from a party who was an old chum of Bulstrode's. I'll tell
you where I first picked him up," said Bambridge, with a sudden gesture
of his fore-finger. "He was at Larcher's sale, but I knew nothing of
him then--he slipped through my fingers--was after Bulstrode, no
doubt. He tells me he can tap Bulstrode to any amount, knows all his
secrets. However, he blabbed to me at Bilkley: he takes a stiff glass.
Damme if I think he meant to turn king's evidence; but he's that sort
of bragging fellow, the bragging runs over hedge and ditch with him,
till he'd brag of a spavin as if it 'ud fetch money. A man should know
when to pull up." Mr. Bambridge made this remark with an air of
disgust, satisfied that his own bragging showed a fine sense of the
marketable.

"What's the man's name? Where can he be found?" said Mr. Hawley.

"As to where he is to be found, I left him to it at the Saracen's Head;
but his name is Raffles."

"Raffles!" exclaimed Mr. Hopkins. "I furnished his funeral yesterday.
He was buried at Lowick. Mr. Bulstrode followed him. A very decent
funeral." There was a strong sensation among the listeners. Mr.
Bambridge gave an ejaculation in which "brimstone" was the mildest
word, and Mr. Hawley, knitting his brows and bending his head forward,
exclaimed, "What?--where did the man die?"

"At Stone Court," said the draper. "The housekeeper said he was a
relation of the master's. He came there ill on Friday."

"Why, it was on Wednesday I took a glass with him," interposed
Bambridge.

"Did any doctor attend him?" said Mr. Hawley

"Yes. Mr. Lydgate. Mr. Bulstrode sat up with him one night. He died
the third morning."

"Go on, Bambridge," said Mr. Hawley, insistently. "What did this
fellow say about Bulstrode?"

The group had already become larger, the town-clerk's presence being a
guarantee that something worth listening to was going on there; and Mr.
Bambridge delivered his narrative in the hearing of seven. It was
mainly what we know, including the fact about Will Ladislaw, with some
local color and circumstance added: it was what Bulstrode had dreaded
the betrayal of--and hoped to have