ine in the bar for 'im. M'appen ye might
find an odd job or two about th' 'ouse an' garden for 'im, just for
lettin' 'im rest a while."

Miss Tranter had nodded curtly in response to this suggestion, but had
promised nothing.

The last to depart from the inn was Tom o' the Gleam. Tom had risen in
what he called his "dark mood." He had eaten no breakfast, and he
scarcely spoke at all as he took up his stout ash stick and prepared to
fare forth upon his way. Miss Tranter was not inquisitive, but she had
rather a liking for Tom, and his melancholy surliness was not lost upon
her.

"What's the matter with you?" she asked sharply. "You're like a bear
with a sore head this morning!"

He looked at her with sombre eyes in which the flame of strongly
restrained passions feverishly smouldered.

"I don't know what's the matter with me," he answered slowly. "Last
night I was happy. This morning I am wretched!"

"For no cause?"

"For no cause that I know of,"--and he heaved a sudden sigh. "It is the
dark spirit--the warning of an evil hour!"

"Stuff and nonsense!" said Miss Tranter.

He was silent. His mouth compressed itself into a petulant line, like
that of a chidden child ready to cry.

"I shall be all right when I have kissed the kiddie," he said.

Miss Tranter sniffed and tossed her head.

"You're just a fool over that kiddie," she declared with emphasis,--"You
make too much of him."

"How can I make too much of my all?" he asked.

Her face softened.

"Well, it's a pity you look at it in that way," she said. "You shouldn't
set your heart on anything in this world."

"Why not?" he demanded. "Is God a friend that He should grudge us love?"

Her lips trembled a little, but she made no reply.

"What am I to set my heart on?" he continued--"If not on anything in
this world, what have I got in the next?"

A faint tinge of colour warmed Miss Tranter's sallow cheeks.

"Your wife's in the next," she answered, quietly.

His face changed--his eyes lightened.

"My wife!" he echoed. "Good woman that you are, you know she was never
my wife! No parson ever mocked us wild birds with his blessing! She was
my love--my love!--so much more than wife! By Heaven! If prayer and
fasting would bring me to the world where _she_ is, I'd fast and pray
till I turned this body of mine to dust and ashes! But my kiddie is all
I have that's left of her; and shall I not love him, nay, worship him
for _her_ sake?"

Miss Tranter tr