n its
neat workmanship, with a few threads already woven, making some fabric
not so very unlike cloth.

I had gone over all these things without noticing that my father was
awake, and that his sharp eye had observed them likewise.

"The lad works hard," said he, half to himself. "He has useful hands
and a clear head." I smiled, but took no notice whatever.

Evening began to close in--less peacefully than usual--over Norton
Bury; for, whenever I ventured to open the window, we heard unusual and
ominous sounds abroad in the town. I trembled inwardly. But John was
prudent, as well as brave: besides, "everybody knew him." Surely he
was safe.

Faithfully, at supper-time, Jem entered. But he could tell us no news;
he had kept watch all the time on the staircase by desire of "Mr.
Halifax"--so he informed me. My father asked no questions--not even
about his mill. From his look, sometimes, I fancied he yet beheld in
fancy these starving men fighting over the precious food, destroyed so
wilfully--nay, wickedly. Heaven forgive me, his son, if I too harshly
use the word; for I think, till the day of his death, that cruel sight
never wholly vanished from the eyes of my poor father.

Jem seemed talkatively inclined. He observed that "master was looking
sprack agin; and warn't this a tidy room, like?"

I praised it; and supposed his mother was better off now?

"Ay, she be. Mr. Halifax pays her a good rent; and she sees 'un made
comfortable. Not that he wants much, being out pretty much all day."

"What is he busy about of nights?"

"Larning," said Jem, with an awed look. "He's terrible wise. But for
all that, sometimes he'll teach Charley and me a bit o' the
Readamadeasy." (Reading-made-easy, I suppose, John's hopeful pupil
meant.) "He's very kind to we, and to mother too. Her says, that her
do, Mr. Halifax--"

"Send the fellow away, Phineas," muttered my father, turning his face
to the wall.

I obeyed. But first I asked, in a whisper, if Jem had any idea when
"Mr. Halifax" would be back?

"He said, maybe not till morning. Them's bad folk about. He was going
to stop all night, either at your house or at the tan-yard, for fear of
a BLAZE."

The word made my father start; for in these times well we knew what
poor folk meant by "a blaze."

"My house--my tan-yard--I must get up this instant--help me. He ought
to come back--that lad Halifax. There's a score of my men at
hand--Wilkes, and Johnson, an