At the end of the first chapter of this volume, it may be remembered, that we left Lord Dewry sitting in the saloon of Dewry Hall with Colonel Manners. Night had become morning before the messengers for whom he waited arrived from Dimden; and when they did so, they brought the tidings that his lordship's well-laid scheme had failed; that no one had been taken by the keepers but a gipsy boy; and that Sir Roger Millington, as well as one of the keepers, had been wounded--the first seriously, the second but slightly. Manners had expected and believed that the peer would both be disappointed and shocked; but a variety of emotions naturally sprang from such tidings, in the situation in which Lord Dewry had placed himself, which could not be understood or calculated by any one unacquainted with all the dreary secrets of his heart. He was disappointed, it is true, that Pharold had not been taken; but he trusted that, with all the means employed against him, the gipsy would not be able to escape.

Far from either shocked or sorry was he, however, that blood had been spilt in the affray between the keepers and the gipsies, or that death might ensue; for he saw that his grasp upon Pharold would thereby be strengthened, though he could have wished, certainly, that the shot which had been fired had found any other bosom than that of Sir Roger Millington, from whom much good service remained still to be derived. Such feelings, of course, produced some effect upon his behaviour, especially as Colonel Manners's cordial co-operation in his plans, without making him entirely forget the different principles upon which they acted, had, in some degree, thrown him off his guard in regard to the minor points of demeanour. The effect, indeed, was not so striking as to lead Manners to suspect anything like the truth; but it was sufficiently marked to call his attention--to appear strange and unpleasant--and to make him think, "This is one of those pampered sons of luxury, who only feel where their own immediate comforts are concerned. He seems to care no more for the people who have been wounded in his service than if they were things of wood."

After a few short comments on the means to be next employed, Manners retired to the chamber prepared for him, and lay down to rest. He rose betimes, however: but it was long ere the peer made his appearance; for, exhausted with activity, and watching, and contending passions--the most wearing of all the many assailants of life and strength--he fell into a deeper slumber than he had known for many years. At length he came, and at a late hour set out with Colonel Manners for Dimden; but since the preceding night a change had come over his feelings towards his companion. Then, in agitation, and horror, and anxiety, he had clung to any one for the sake of society; and more especially to one whose character and reputation gave him confidence, and whose warm co-operation afforded support. Now, however, he was going to hear from his agents the progress of dark and subtle plans of which Colonel Manners knew nothing--to examine and speak with persons whom he had engaged in proceedings equally cunning and unjustifiable; and he could very well have dispensed with the presence of one whose bold good sense was likely to search and see further than might be at all convenient.

These feelings influenced his demeanour also; and although he could not be absolutely rude to a person he had so lately courted, and who was so perfectly independent of him in every respect, yet his manners were throughout the journey sufficiently cold and repulsive to make Manners determine to bring their companionship to a close as speedily as possible. On their arrival at Dimden, the gipsy lad was sent for, and a few casual questions asked him by the peer, which he repelled by either obdurate silence or sullen monosyllables. This, however, was what Lord Dewry for the present desired; but Colonel Manners was resolved, if possible, to hear more, and he plied the prisoner with every question which he judged likely to elicit some information concerning his poor friend De Vaux. Little satisfactory news did he, indeed, obtain; and, in fact, received no reply to the greater part of his interrogations. Still the impression upon his mind, from one or two occasional words which the lad was induced to speak, was strong, that he at least was ignorant that De Vaux had been murdered, and thence arose in Manners's mind the first reasonable hope that his friend might still be living.

After the space of nearly an hour thus spent, the youth was removed. The peer made no comment; but after looking out of the window, called some of the servants, and inquired after Sir Roger Millington. The reply was, that the knight suffered considerable agony, and that the surgeon was with him still.

"Colonel Manners, you must excuse me for half an hour, while I visit my unfortunate friend," said Lord Dewry, with a frigid bow. "My poor son's death," he added, while his quivering lip, at the very mention of his son's name, betrayed that on that subject, at least, his heart was painfully sensible--"my poor son's death, of course, weighs heavily upon me; but I must not forget my wounded friend. I do not contemplate being detained longer than half an hour, and then I will have the honour of setting you down at Morley House as I drive home."

"Do not hurry yourself, my lord," answered Manners, calmly: "I have some inquiries to make concerning my poor friend, and the means that have been taken to discover anything of his fate; and therefore, as I sent my horse over to Morley House this morning, I will walk thither. I wish you good-day."

As it was not the peer's wish or intention to deprive himself altogether of Colonel Manners's influence and support in his further measures against the gipsy--although he heartily desired his absence for the time--he changed his tone in some degree, and pressed Manners to stay; but took care, at the same time, to add such inducements as he knew were not very likely to have any weight with him, assuring him that the distance was full five miles, and the road fatiguing and hilly.

Manners, however, as the peer expected, persisted in his design; and, taking leave, he walked out into the park, while Lord Dewry left the room, as if to proceed to the apartment of Sir Roger Millington. Before following him, however, it may be as well to say, that Manners did not direct his steps, in the first instance, to Morley House; but thinking, "His lordship, in his concern for this Sir Roger Millington, seems entirely to have forgotten the poor keeper they talked of," he stopped at the gate, and inquired whither the wounded man had been carried. The old woman at the lodge gave him the necessary direction; and proceeding to the cottage which she described, Manners entered with that sort of frank good feeling that stands on no ceremonies where the object is humane.

He found the wounded keeper still suffering considerably; and he found also, as he had been inclined to suspect, that the attention of the surgeon having been hitherto occupied by the patient of higher rank, the keeper had been entirely neglected. He was consequently more ill and feverish than the nature of his wound would otherwise have accounted for; and Manners, knowing, from much experience in such occurrences, that if proper care were not taken, a slight injury might have a fatal termination, instantly despatched a messenger for the surgeon who was attending Miss De Vaux, and kindly waited his arrival.

In conversation with the keeper, he learned that Pharold had not been present when the guns were fired, and from him, also, he heard the particulars of the affray in Dimden Park, the wound the man had received not having been sufficiently severe to deprive him of the power of observing everything that occurred around him afterward. By the whole of his narrative the character of Pharold rose in Manners's opinion, and his hopes of De Vaux's safety were strengthened: but still he determined to act as if such hopes did not exist; and accompanying the surgeon on his late return to the village near Morley House, he prepared to pursue the search for the gipsy as ardently as ever. What followed his arrival we have already seen.

In the mean while Lord Dewry proceeded through the long and somewhat dreary galleries of Dimden House to a distant apartment, but not to the chamber in which the participator in his dark schemes lay on a bed of agony and distress. The room he sought was solitary; and, ringing the bell, he ordered Harvey, the head keeper, to be sent to him. The man was already in the house, waiting his orders, and somewhat apprehensive of his lord's displeasure at the failure of his plans. But as long as Pharold was alive and free, there was a demon of fear in the bosom of Lord Dewry that cowed the more violent passions of his nature in the presence of those whom he used as his tools. The consciousness of the designs in which he employed them made him treat them gently, from vague but anxious surmises that, notwithstanding all his care, they might suspect the motives of the plans they mingled with.

Although, then, in his heart, he could have felled the keeper to the earth for letting Pharold escape him. In addressed him mildly when he presented himself. "Why, how is this, Harvey?" he said: "you have let the game escape us. There must have been a fault somewhere."

"The fault was in the cursed cowardice of the fellows that were with me, my lord," replied the keeper; "if they would but have followed me, we should have taken the blackfaced villain any how. Two or three of us might have got wounded, but no matter for that; we should have had him safe here, if they would but have come on. But one fell back, and another fell back; so that when I had got them up against the wall there were but two with me, and two could do nothing against a good dozen."

"Let me hear how the whole business took place," said the peer: "remember that I have no full account of it from any one; and we must try to remedy what has gone wrong."

The park-keeper was, of course, glad enough to tell his story in the way that best suited him; and he related the events which we already know according to his own particular version. The first error, he declared, was, that several of the men whom he had hired for the purpose of capturing the gipsies were too late at the rendezvous, and several did not come at all. These disappointments, and the delay they occasioned, had prevented his taking advantage of the moment when the gipsies' guns were discharged after the slaughter of the deer, and, as time lost is never regained, had caused the ultimate failure of his whole plan. He assured the peer, however, that Pharold had been one of the party engaged in the destruction of the game; and that he had been active in the affray wherein Sir Roger Millington and the keeper had been wounded. Some of the other men, he said, were not very clear about these facts, but he was ready to swear to it. He then related how the boy William had been seized by two of his party, who had been detached for that purpose; and he added a long account of the measures which he had taken in order to trace the gipsies in their flight.

"Is the keeper badly wounded?" demanded the peer, thoughtfully.

"He did not seem bad at first, my lord," replied the man; "but they say he is much worse this afternoon, and his wife is afraid he will die."

The peer muttered something between his teeth, which might be, "So much the better;" but this sound reached Harvey's ears but imperfectly, and Lord Dewry went on in a louder tone, "Poor fellow! have you seen him, Harvey?"

"Not myself, my lord," answered the keeper; "but his wife came up to see if the doctor could go down, and I spoke with her for a minute."

"Poor fellow!" said the peer; "but we must take care that his murderer does not escape, Harvey. Have you thought of no way by which we can catch him?"

"Why, he is a keen hand, that Pharold, my lord," replied the keeper; "but I do think we can manage it, if your lordship likes to try."

"Try!" said Lord Dewry: "I will make him a rich and happy man, Harvey, who brings that villain to justice. But how do you think it can be managed?"

"Why, I scarcely know as yet, my lord," answered the keeper; "I have had sure eyes upon some of the gipsy folks, and think I can make out whereabouts they have gone to; but Pharold knows better than to go with them. Besides, he was in the park there, not many hours ago, in the broad daylight."

"Impudent villain!" cried the peer; "but what in the name of Heaven could bring him there? Are you sure it was he?"

"I saw him with my own eyes, my lord," replied the keeper; "and had nearly caught him with my own hands; for we had him pinned in between seven and eight of us and the river: but without minding us more than if we had been rabbits, he took to the water like a hard-run fox, and swam the river outright."

Lord Dewry paused; for there was something in the daring hardihood of the gipsy congenial to the bold and fearless spirit which had animated himself in early years; and he felt a sort of stern admiration which even hatred could not quell. At length, however, he repeated, "But what could bring him here? He could not be fool enough to come for the sole purpose of daring his pursuers."

"No, no, my lord," answered Harvey. "He came after this boy that we caught, I dare say. The boy may be a bit of a relation, or, at all events, a friend; and they did not know what had become of him, for he was taken apart. Now, my lord, I was thinking--if, might be so bold--that one might, perhaps, turn this boy to some account, and get him--do you see, my lord?"

The mind of the peer had been so long habituated to revolve dark and tortuous schemes, that it was apt and ready to comprehend the significant word, or half-spoken hint, which often forms the language of those who are afraid to give their purposes full utterance. Thus he gained an instant insight into the nature of the plan which the keeper had conceived, although he saw not the details; and he answered, "I do see, Harvey, I do see! That is to say, I see what you mean; but I do not see how it is to be managed. If the boy had any means of communicating with his own gang, he might, perhaps, lure the chief villain of the whole into our net; but we know not where they are, and he, in all probability, is still more ignorant."

"I know well enough where a part of them are," answered the keeper. "Some went down towards the water, and I cannot trace them: but some, for a certainty, went across the common to the Dingley wood, where they are still, I am sure; and I should not wonder if the others soon joined them, for it is uncommon what a fancy those gipsies have for sticking to each other, especially in misfortune; and I should not wonder if they were to hang about here till they hear what becomes of this lad. He may be Pharold's son, for any thing I know."

"Would that he were! would that he were!" cried the peer, vehemently, the memory of his own son crossing the confused crowd of other thoughts that pressed upon his brain. "Would that he were! I would find the means to wring his heart. But still," he added, after pausing for some moments on the pleasant thoughts of revenge--"but still the boy is cut off from all communication with them."

"But we can let him have some, if your lordship pleases," said the keeper. "If your lordship remembers, I told you of a man named Harry Saxon, who always has a good deal to do with poachers and such like, and who put these gipsies up to the deer-stealing. Now we could let him get speech of the boy; and if any one heard of it, we would say it was only to see whether he could swear to the youth, and he would soon take any message to his people for him."

"But will he undertake the task? and can we depend upon him?" asked the peer.

"Why, ye--s, my lord, I think we may," answered Harvey, thoughtfully. "He's a good sort of a man enough; and besides, I rather think I could send him across the water to Botany, if I liked, for something I saw him do one day, and he knows it too; and so he is always very civil and obliging to me."

"Well may he be so," replied the peer, with a curling lip. "But can you get at him soon? There's no time to be lost in such a business."

"I can get at him in a minute," answered the keeper; "for he came up to my house about an hour ago; and he is in a bit of a fright about all this bad business of the shooting. So I told him to stay there till I had seen your lordship, and I would tell him how things went when I came back."

"Go and bring him then," said the peer quickly--"go and bring him--yet stay a moment, Harvey. Let me consider what is to be done when he does come. He is to be admitted to speech of this gipsy lad; and what then?"

"Why, my lord, I dare say the boy can be frightened into sending a message to Pharold to come down and help him out."

"No, no, no," said the peer, "it must be better arranged than that. Let me see. The windows of the strong room look out into the close wood, and any one from the outside could saw away the iron bars. Yes, that will do. But the lad himself must be tutored in the first place. Quick, then, Harvey, go and bring your friend; and in the meantime I will see the boy alone. Do not come in till you hear that I have sent for you."

The keeper retired, and the peer again rang the bell, to direct that the young gipsy should be brought before him once more. His orders were promptly obeyed, and two stout fellows appeared, with the prisoner between them.

"Leave him with me," said the peer, as soon as they had brought him two or three steps forward in the room. The men, who had calculated on enjoying all the pleasures of a cross-examination, and who had even in their hearts formed the aspiration that they hoped his lordship would pump him well, stared with some mortification at being excluded from witnessing the mental torture of their fellow-creature; but Lord Dewry, who read something of the kind in their countenances, not only repeated his command, but bade them wait at the end of the adjoining passage till they were joined by Harvey, the head keeper. There was no resource; and therefore they obeyed, shutting the door, and leaving the peer face to face with the captive.

The gipsy youth might be eighteen or nineteen years of age; that season of life when enjoyment is in its first freshness; when all the world is as bright, and as sweet, and as sparkling as a summer morning; when imagination and passion are setting out hand in hand upon the ardent race that soon wearies them, and when memory follows them quick, gathering up the flowers that they pluck and cast away as they go, but not as yet burdened with any of the cares, or sorrows, or disappointments which they are destined to encounter in the end: he was, in fact, at that age when life is the sweetest. His form was full of nascent vigour, and his face was fine; but his whole countenance, though speaking, by its variety and play of feature, active imagination, and perhaps a degree of enterprise, betrayed a sort of uncertain, undecided expression, which is never to be seen in the face of the firm and the determined. The peer gazed on him for a moment, seeing all, and calculating all, in order to work upon his prisoner's mind by both his circumstances and his weaknesses.

"You are very young," he said at length, in a tone of stern gravity--"you are very young to be engaged in crimes like these. What is your age?"

That sort of dogged sullenness, half shyness, half hatred, which a contemned and separate race are from their infancy taught by nature to display towards their oppressors, was the only source of resistance in the character of the young gipsy, whose powers of resolution were naturally small, and whose mind was unfortified by firm and vigorous principles of any kind. It was sufficient in the present instance, however, to keep him silent; and he stood, with his dark eyes fixed upon the ground, and his arms hanging by his side, apparently as unmoved as if the peer had addressed him in a language that he did not comprehend.

"You are very young," repeated Lord Dewry, after waiting some time in vain for an answer--"you are very young to be engaged in crimes like these. Life must be sweet to you: there must be a thousand pleasures that you are just beginning to enjoy, a thousand hopes of greater pleasures hereafter; there must be many friends that you grieve to part with--and some," he added, seeing the youth's lip quiver--"and some that, doubtless, you love beyond anything on earth."

A tear rolled over the rich brown cheek of the gipsy boy, and betrayed that he not only understood what was said to him, but felt every word at his heart's core, as the peer, with barbarous skill, sought out every fresh wound in his bosom, and tearing them open one by one, poured in the rankling poison of insincere commiseration. "Ah!" continued Lord Dewry, "it is sad and terrible, indeed, to think of being--at the very moment when one is the happiest--at the very moment when one loves one's friends the best--at the very moment, perhaps, when all our hopes are about to be fulfilled--to think of being cut off from them all, and to die a horrid and painful death! and yet such must be your fate, my poor boy; such must be inevitably your fate, as a punishment for the murder committed in my park last night."

"I murdered no one," cried the youth, with a convulsive sob, that nearly rendered what he said unintelligible. "I murdered no one."

"But your companions did," answered the peer, glad to have forced him into breaking silence. "You were not present, it is true; but you trespassed on my park for evil purposes with those who did commit murder, and are therefore an accessary to the deed. Banish all hope, poor boy; for to-morrow I must certainly commit you to the county jail, from which you will only go to trial and to execution. I am sorry for you, I grieve for you, to think that you must never see again those you love; that you must be cut off in the prime of youth and happiness--I grieve for you, indeed."

"Then why do you not let me out?" cried the lad. "If you grieve for me, let me run away."

"That is impossible," answered the peer; "but perhaps I may do something to make your fate less bitter. Death you must undergo; but in the mean time I may soften the strictness of your imprisonment. Is there any one whom you would wish to see--any of your friends and companions who might comfort you by coming to visit you?"

"What is the use, if I must die?" said the gipsy, sullenly, dropping his tearful eyes to the ground, and clenching tighter his clasped hands together; but Lord Dewry saw that there was something more working in his mind, and warily held his peace. "There is none I should like to see but Lena," said the gipsy at length, with a deep sigh; "and Pharold would not let her come, even if I were to ask."

"And why not?" demanded the peer, affecting as much unconcern as it was possible for him to assume when coming near the very subject of his wishes. "Why would any one prevent her from coming, if it would comfort you? He must be very cruel to deny you, when you have so short a time to live."

"No, he is not cruel," said the youth; "he is hard, but not cruel; but he would not let her come, do you see, because a year ago I was to have had Lena for my wife--at least so Mother Gray always told me: but then Pharold loved her; and though her own love did not lie that way, her mother, when she was dying, herself gave Lena to him, because he was better able to take care of her than any one else. And he does not love to see Lena speak to me, I know."

"So he took your bride from you," said the peer, not a little delighted to hear tidings which promised so fairly for success; "he took your bride from you, and now he is jealous of you. Well, then, listen to me, and mark well what I am about to say. Your fate is in your own hands. You are left to choose between life and death!"

The youth gazed dully in his face for a moment, as if he did not comprehend his words at first; but the next instant he burst forth, "Life, life, life, then!" cried he, clasping his hands together, and raising his eyes beaming with new hope: "life, oh, I choose life!"

"There is but one way, however," replied the peer, "by which you can obtain it. This Pharold, this very man who took away your bride, I have every reason to believe killed my brother and murdered my son."

"Then that is the way he gets money, no one knows how," cried the youth.

"Most probably it is," answered Lord Dewry; "but mark me, if you can contrive a means to get him into my power, you shall not only go free, but have a large reward. This is your only chance for life."

The lad's countenance fell in a moment. He was young, and the better spirit was the first to act. "No, no," he cried; "I hate Pharold, but I will not betray him."

"Then you must die," said the peer, sternly.

The better spirit was still predominant: no image presented itself to the youth's mind but that of betraying the chief of his tribe. He thought not for the moment of the loveliness of life, he thought not of the horrors of death, he remembered not either love or hate, in the strong impression of a duty which had been fixed in his heart from childhood; and he answered in a low sad tone, "Then die I will."

"But think," said the peer, who had anticipated the first effect of his proposal, and reserved every stronger inducement, every palliating argument, to tempt and to excuse the unhappy youth, when the immediate impression was over--"think what it is you choose--imprisonment in a close room by yourself for several days; then trial and condemnation, and then death upon a gibbet, with nobody to comfort you, nobody to speak to you; but you must go through the horror, and the agony, and the shame all alone and unsupported." The boy shuddered, and the peer proceeded, changing the picture, however:--"This is what you choose. Now what is it you cast away?--life, and happiness, and more wealth than ever you knew, and most probably the possession of the girl you love best upon the earth."

The peer was experienced in temptations; for he had undergone and yielded to them himself, and he knew, by the dark histories of his own heart, all the wiles and artifices by which the fiend lures on successfully even the firm and the determined to acts at which they have shuddered in their days of innocence.

The young gipsy listened, and hesitated, and felt all his resolutions give way; but so fearful was the struggle in his bosom, that his limbs trembled and his teeth chattered as if he had been shaken by an ague. The keen eye that was upon him, however, did not fail to mark and understand his emotion; and Lord Dewry proceeded, "Well may Lena think you love her but little, when you scruple, by a few words, to break the hateful bonds that tie her to this murderer Pharold, and when you have the power to make her your own, yet refuse to use it."

"But I tell you," cried the boy, vehemently, "that Lena would never consent; that even if she were to know that I had done such a thing she would hate me and curse me; that I should be driven forth from my people, and never see her more."

"But neither she nor any one else," replied the peer, "need ever know one circumstance about it. If you will undertake to do what I wish, I will tell you a plan by which it may be accomplished, without any being on the earth knowing it but you and I."

"But if Pharold should be innocent," said the youth, "the guiltless blood would be upon my hand, and it would curse me."

"But if Pharold be innocent, his blood shall not be shed," replied the peer: "let him prove his innocence, and he shall go as free as you; but he cannot prove his innocence, for he is guilty; and you, in delivering him up, do but what is right and good; you do but avenge the innocent blood he has shed, though at the same time you gain for yourself life, and liberty, and happiness, and the girl that you love."

"Well, well, well!" cried the boy, "tell me what it is I am to do."

"Will you undertake it?" demanded the peer, eagerly.

"If," answered the gipsy--for probably there was never yet a crime committed, in regard to which the criminal did not propose some palliating motive, in order to deceive his own heart at the time, and to calm the anticipated reproaches of his conscience thereafter--"if you will promise, by God and the heavens, that, if Pharold is innocent, you will let him go free."

Lord Dewry paused for an instant. It is strange, but no less true than strange, that the mind not only habituates itself to evil, but habituates itself to a particular course of evil, and the same person who will boldly reiterate a crime to which he is accustomed, will start at a much less heinous offence, if it be new to his habits. Thus, Lord Dewry paused for an instant ere he swore to a promise which he intended to evade; but he soon remembered that, in the course which he was pursuing, there was no halting at so airy a thing as an oath; and he replied, "By all that is sacred, he shall go free, if he proves himself innocent."

"Well, then," said the youth, "I will do what you wish; but, oh, if you deceive me!"

"Deceive you in what?" demanded the peer. "I have promised that, if he prove himself innocent, he shall of course go free: it is but just."

"But it was not of that I spoke," said the gipsy: "I thought if you were to deceive me into trapping Pharold, and then not to let me go myself!"

"On my honour! on my soul!" cried the peer, with a ready vehemence, which convinced the youth more easily than would have been possible, if he had known how often men pledge their honour and their soul when the real jewels are no longer theirs--when their true honour has been lost for years, and their soul pawned deeply to an eternal foe.

"Well, well," he answered, "I will do it. Tell me how it is to be done."

"Tell me first," said the peer: "this Pharold--he is jealous of you, it seems?" The boy smiled faintly. "Will he, then, take sufficient interest in your fate to attempt to rescue you, if he thinks there is a probability of success?"

"That he will!" answered the youth; "besides, if I could get at Lena, she would persuade him. But how can I get at her? She will not come here, and I cannot go to her."

"But do you think that if you were to send a message to her," demanded Lord Dewry, "that she would try to persuade him to attempt your rescue, and that she has influence enough to work him to her purpose?"

"That she has, that she has," answered the gipsy: "Pharold often gives her a cross word; but when she likes to try, she can always get her own way, for all that. But how can I send a message to her? I know not where she is, nor where Pharold is; though once, as I looked out through the bars of the window this morning, I thought I saw him through the gray mist, standing under the distant trees, and watching the house. But they may have gone far before this time; yet, if you were to let me out for a few hours, I would soon find them."

"We will seek a better way," answered the peer, without taking any further notice of the simple cunning with which the youth spoke. "I hear from my gamekeepers that a man from one of the neighbouring villages has been inquiring for you, and most likely he knows where your friends and companions are. Now, as you promise to do what I ask, he shall be admitted to see you, and you must send to Lena whatever message you think will induce her to persuade Pharold to come to your rescue."

"Yes," said the boy; "but I must first know how he can rescue me, for Pharold will never come unless he thinks it likely. Ay, and the story must be a clever one, too; for he is as cunning as a sentinel-crow, and smells powder at a mile's distance."

"I must leave you to frame the story as you think best," replied the peer; "but you can tell your fair Lena that if Pharold will come to your prison-window with a sharp file or a sledge-hammer, he can easily set you free by breaking the bars of iron that cross the opening. You may add, that there is never any one on that side of the house all night, and so that he will be perfectly safe."

The lad hung down his head; and the hot blood of shame, as he thought of what he was undertaking, rushed from his heart to his cheeks. There was again a momentary struggle, but the good had been conquered once already; and the thought of life, and Lena, and happiness, and freedom from the oppressive terror that weighed down his heart in his prison, got the better of everything besides; and he replied, "But what shall I do if they thrust the file and the sledge-hammer through the bars to me, and bid me work for myself?"

Lord Dewry instantly saw the validity of the youth's objection, and the probability that Pharold, instead of coming himself, would send some woman or some child with the implements which might be necessary for setting the prisoner at liberty. "You must tell them," he said, after some minutes' thought, "that you are so tied that you cannot cut through the bars for yourself."

"But the man who gives them the message will see that I am not tied," replied the youth; and, after pausing for a few moments, he added, "No, no; I have thought of a better way. I will not trust him with any particulars: I will bid him ask Lena and Mother Gray to work Pharold to get me out; but, at all events, for some one of them to come down, and speak with me through the bars to-night, and then I can make them do what I want. But you must let them go, remember!" he exclaimed. "You must not stop the women if they come."

"I shall certainly stop none but Pharold," answered the peer: "the rest may come and go as they like. But only do not you trifle with me; for be you sure that you shall not only not have your liberty, but that, if Pharold be not in my power before to-morrow night is over, you shall be sent to the county-jail for instant trial."

"And how," said the youth, whose shyness was fast wearing away--"and how am I to get my liberty when Pharold is in your power?"

"The door shall be set open," answered the peer, "and you shall go out freely."

"But how can I be sure of that?" he demanded again.

"You may keep us both, for aught I know. Will you write it down? for I have heard that you Englishmen are more bound by what is written than by what is said."

Lord Dewry again paused for a moment, somewhat embarrassed; but after revolving the probable consequences in his mind for some time, he replied, "I will write it down, if you require it."

"Do--do, then," said the youth; and the peer, ringing the bell, ordered writing-materials to be brought. As soon as they arrived, he sat down, and drew up a promise, artfully couched in such terms as he felt sure could not, in the slightest degree, implicate his character or betray his real views, if ever it should be produced against him.

"As the prisoner," so the writing ran, "now in custody at Dimden, is apparently only an accessary, and not a principal, in the crime lately committed at this place, I hereby promise him, on condition of his placing in the hands of justice the notorious felon Pharold, against whom various warrants have issued, at present unsuccessfully, that he shall be immediately set at liberty, as soon as he has accomplished the same. In witness whereof, I have hereunto set my hand, this---- day of ----," &c. &c.

The youth's eyes sparkled as he read; and the prospect of liberty and safety which opened before him blotted out at once from memory the dark and villanous step which he must take to reach them. "I will do it! I will do it!" he cried; "but you must let me do it my own way, for I must not let anyone in the whole world know that it is my doing. It must seem that he is taken by accident, while helping me, and that I have made my escape in the meantime; and then I shall be free, and Lena will be mine!" And the youth clapped his hands in the vehemence of reawakened hope.

"Well, well," said the peer, his anxiety for his ultimate object coming eagerly upon him as soon as his immediate purpose was accomplished--"well, well, the man I spoke of shall have admittance to you immediately. But, remember, you must lose no time; for the longest space I can afford you is this night and to-morrow night."

"Some of the women will come to me to-night," answered the youth; "and to-morrow night, fear not, Pharold shall stand under the window of the prison-room, some time between the rising of the moon and the sun. So watch well, and if you take him not it is your own fault."

"So be it, then," said the peer; "and now you must return to speak with the person I mentioned, who shall soon be sent to you." Thus saying, Lord Dewry called back the two men who had brought the young gipsy thither; and, after bidding them take him back to the strong room, told them, in his hearing, as an earnest of his good-will, to let him have everything that could render him comfortable in strict imprisonment. As soon as the men appeared, the boy resumed his look of sullen shyness; and, hanging his head, followed them in silence from the room.

The moment he had departed, the peer sent to inquire for the keeper, who had not yet returned, however; and Lord Dewry was kept for a short time under the irritation of his own impatient spirit. At length Harvey appeared, followed by his confederate, Harry Saxon; and it would have given sincere pleasure to a disciple of Lavater to see how well this worthy's countenance corresponded with his actions.

He was a man of about five-and-forty, and what many people would call a good-looking man; that is to say, he had a fresh country complexion, a high large nose, with small nostrils, a capacious mouth, furnished with white and regular teeth, a small keen black eye, under a very overhanging and observing brow, a forehead low, but broad, and surmounted with a layer of fine jet-black hair, smoothed down, and polished with the most careful and scrupulous precision. His dress, without being exactly that of a gamekeeper, had a sufficient portion of the style usually attributed to that class to show his hankering after the beasts of the field. His coat was green, and on the buttons thereof appeared, not alone the fox, that most sagacious animal, but a variety of birds and beasts, so comprehensive in their number, and so limited in their kind, that his garment formed a very excellent hieroglyphical abstract of the game act. Leathern gaiters, with small round leathern buttons, cased a pair of sturdy legs, and defended them from the brambles of those paths he most frequented; and a pair of hedger's gloves upon his hands seemed well calculated to grope for springes and gins amid the thorny ways of life.

The peer surveyed him, as he entered, with the keen eye of worldly experience, and saw that he was a man to be depended on by those who could pay him well. After a brief question or two, to which the other replied with sly significance, the peer explained to him the ostensible object he had in view; namely, that of securing the apprehension of a gipsy felon called Pharold, by the instrumentality of the boy they had taken on the preceding night, and asked him if he were willing to undertake the part he was to play, and to perform it carefully.

"You are, I hear," he added, with some degree of irony, "in some way acquainted with these gipsies, and may, therefore, not like to bring one of them to justice. If it be so, speak, and we will find some other person."

"No, no, my lord," answered the man. "A gipsy! why, I hate a gipsy! they come in and spoil every thing like the regular trade. No, no, hang 'em all for me."

Lord Dewry did not pause to inquire what Harry Saxon called the regular trade; but replied, "Well, if such be your opinion, go in and speak to this lad. Do not let him know that you have had any conversation with me upon the subject; but offer to do anything for him that you can; and when you have heard what he has to say, come back and let me know the result."

The peer added an injunction to be quick; and Harry Saxon was conducted, by his worthy associate Harvey, to the strong room in which the gipsy lad had been confined.

The chamber would have been in every respect a comfortable one, had not the doors and windows been furnished on the outside with those appurtenances, obnoxious to all comfort, called bolts and bars. The house had been constructed when population was much thinner than at present, and when it was necessary that the dwelling of a magistrate, if situated far from any great town, should be provided with some place in which a prisoner might be confined for a few hours; for this purpose the room we speak of had been selected and fitted up, both on account of the distance at which it lay from the more frequented parts of the building, and of its proximity to a large old hall, which formed the extreme wing of the house, and topped the bank overhanging the river. This hall had often served, in cases of necessity, as a justice-room in the olden times; and though many years had elapsed since it had been employed on any very important occasion, yet even of later days it had been used for the meeting of magistrates and county functionaries, when anything caused them to assemble in that part of the country.

The strong room, however, had never been intended for anything but temporary purposes, and was not at all calculated for securing a strong and determined prisoner for any length of time, as the windows, which opened into the park, were only closed by iron bars, which, as the peer had hinted, might easily be filed away from within, or forced off from without. These bars the boy took care to examine minutely as soon as he was taken back to the place of his confinement; and he then turned his eyes to the park beyond, to ascertain how far the plan he had to propose to Pharold would be recommended by the probability of its success.

A grove of old oaks and chestnuts came up nearly to the windows, so that there was plenty of shade to conceal any one who approached, except in the full light of day. But as he gazed, the boy's thoughts were soon drawn away from the dark scheme which the peer had suggested to him by the sight of the world beyond his prison. Through the wide spaces between the trees the lawns and savannas of the park were to be distinguished, with other woods and groves beyond. The soft evening sunshine was sleeping upon the slopes and glistening on the river; and the deer were seen walking calm and free through the long dry autumn grass, while the call of the partridge sounded from some distant fields, and everything spoke of liberty, and happiness, and peace. The influence of the scene sank deep into his heart, as he stood separated from his people, barred in from the free and beautiful world, and, for the first time in his existence, confined to the close atmosphere of one small solitary room. It sank deep into his bosom; but, like the fabled amreeta cup of one of our truest poets, many of the sweetest things on earth are productive of good or evil according to the lip that tastes them. While he gazed, the passionate love of wild unrestrained liberty, and of nature, in which his heart had been nurtured from infancy, grew overpowering. To be free--to bound away over those sunny fields--to cast bars and bolts behind him--became a passion and burning thirst: better principles were wanting to teach him to endure; and had the price of liberty, at that moment, been a parricide, he would have dipped his hands in parental blood. Nerved by the passionate desire, he seized the bars of iron in his hands, and strove to tear them open; but their strength resisted all his efforts, and he burst into tears to think that he must remain another day in bondage.

His eyes were still wet when the door opened, and the insidious prompter of the enterprise which had deprived him of his liberty entered the room. The youth, however, was, like the rest of the gipsies, ignorant that they had been betrayed; and although he had only seen the man once, he now received him gladly as an acquaintance and a friend.

Their conversation lasted about ten minutes, and at the end of that time the emissary returned to the peer to report what had just passed.

"Well, well," demanded Lord Dewry, "with what message has he charged you?"

"A very short one, my lord," answered the man: "he bade me seek out old Mother Gray, or some of the women, and tell them to come down to speak with him at the window to-night; so, I take it, that won't suit your lordship's purpose."

"Yes, it will," answered the peer. "He will, probably, employ the women to work upon the men."

"Ay, ay, plough with the heifer," answered the other; "but I may as well, if your lordship has no objection, set them on the right track myself; and I will answer for it, I get them to persuade old Pharold to come down himself."

"There is a very large reward offered," answered the peer, dryly, "to any one who will contribute to place him in the hands of justice; and if you are successful in the attempt you shall not lose the reward. But do you think you can find these gipsies?"

"Why, from what Dick Harvey says, my lord," he replied, "I think there can be no doubt that I can find the women part of them, though, most likely, the men are hiding away--and no bad job either; for they might fancy I had some hand in the last night's job--but, howsomever, if I can find the women, they'll make the men do what they like easy enough. So, if your lordship will keep a good watch round the strong room, without letting the folks show themselves till they are sure of their man, I think we may calculate upon Master Pharold pretty certain."

"In which case your reward is certain, too," answered the peer; "but now make haste upon your errand, my good man, for the sun will soon be going down, and you have but little time."

"Oh, I don't dislike a walk in the twilight," replied the fellow; and, bowing low, but with a somewhat too familiar grin, he took his leave and retired.

Lord Dewry immediately proceeded to give orders for a strict watch to be kept upon the windows of the strong room during the two following nights; and took measures that an ambush should be laid in the immediate vicinity, in such a manner that any person approaching could not escape; but, at the same time, he carefully directed that if none but women appeared, they should be permitted to go as they came, not only without molestation, but with every precaution to prevent the least appearance of unusual watch.

This being done, he turned his steps towards the chamber of Sir Roger Millington, for whose life the unfavourable opinion of the surgeon gave him no slight apprehension.