his very entrails
were convulsed with fear. The apparition then moved onwards, still
keeping her eyes upon the couch. She stood for a moment near the window,
raised her arm with a monitory gesture to the sky, and then all at once
seemed to disappear as it absorbed in the watery moonshine. Grobey was
as bold a bagman as ever flanked a mare with his gig-whip, but this
awful visitation was too much. Boots, looking-glass, and table swam with
a distracting whirl before his eyes; he uttered a feeble yell, and
immediately lapsed into a swoon.

It was bright morning when he awoke. He started up, rubbed his eyes, and
endeavoured to persuade himself that it was all an illusion. To be sure
there were the boots untouched, the coat, the hat, and the portmanteau;
but where--oh where--were the watch and the plethoric pocketbook, with
its bunch of bank-notes and other minor memoranda? Gone--spirited away;
and with a shout of despair old Grobey summoned the household.

The police were straightway taken into his confidence. The tale of the
midnight apparition--of the Demon Lady--was told and listened to, at
first with somewhat of an incredulous smile; but when the landlord
stated that an unknown damosel had been sojourning for two days at the
hotel, that she had that morning vanished in a hackney-coach without
leaving any trace of her address, and that, moreover, certain spoons of
undeniable silver were amissing, Argus pricked up his ears, and after
some few preliminary inquiries, issued forth in quest of the fugitive.
Two days afterwards the fair Saville was discovered in a temperance
hotel; and although the pocketbook had disappeared, both the
recognisable notes and the watch were found in her possession. A number
of pawn-tickets, also, which were contained in her reticule, served to
collect from divers quarters a great mass of _bijouterie_, amongst which
were the Blenheim spoons.

Such was Mr Grobey's evidence as afterwards supplemented by the police.
Tom rose to cross-examine.

"Pray, Mr Grobey," said he, adjusting his gown upon his shoulders with a
very knowing and determined air as though he intended to expose his
victim--"Pray, Mr Grobey, are you any judge of studs?"

"I ain't a racing man," replied Grobey, "but I knows an oss when I sees
it."

"Don't equivocate, sir, if you please. Recollect you are upon your
oath," said Strachan, irritated by a slight titter which followed upon
Grobey's answer. "I mean studs, sir--emeral