ught you. Me break it? You know I never did. Why, I've
never been in the place since you and master have been in here busy.
Shame on you, Master Tom! Go and tell your uncle, like you ought. It's
an accident; but don't you go and make it worse," and with these words
David stumped out of the lower part of the old mill, and made his way
back to his garden, leaving Tom hot with indignation against him, and
half choking with a feeling of misery.

"And uncle has got to know," he said half aloud; "uncle has got to
know."

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN.

The speculum that was never to reflect the bright face of the moon was
easily moved now, and Tom stooped down and picked up one by one the
three triangular pieces, and laid them upon the bench, to find then that
a good-sized elliptical piece, something in shape like a fresh-water
mussel-shell, yet remained upon the stones. This he raised, and found
that it fitted in at the edge beneath.

There was nothing to be gained in what he did, but Tom stood there
carefully fitting the fractures together, and spending a great deal of
time over the task, while the mirror reflected his sorrowful face as he
bent over it. And as he ran his fingers along the three lines of union,
the boy's thoughts went back to the scene that evening at Mornington
Crescent, when the big china vase was dragged down, to break to shivers
in the hall.

"And Sam said I broke that, just as David says I broke this, and all to
escape blame. I don't want to tell uncle that David broke it, but I
must; I'm not going to take the blame myself, for it would be cowardly
as well as lying. But it is so hard. He will be so angry."

So Tom communed as he pieced the fragments of the mirror together,
ending by getting the sponge, rinsing it well, and carefully removing a
few smears and finger-marks, before taking a clean cloth and wiping it
quite dry.

"That's no good," he said bitterly. "I'm only doing it so as to keep
from going and telling uncle, and I must tell him--I must tell him, and
the sooner the better."

But still he did not stir. He picked up the blanket, and folded that up
neatly, to lay it beside the speculum, and then looked round for
something else to do.

This he found in the window, which he opened and shut two or three times
over, before drawing away from it, with a sigh, and going to the door to
look across at the house, where his uncle would be writing.

"I ought to go and tell him, but it is s