Barnabas Thorpe had been blessed all his life with a physique that was strong enough to bear the exactions of his spirit. In this respect he had been remarkably fortunate. But, after all, his body was made of flesh and blood; and flesh and blood give way at last.

It was a great source of grief to him that he could no longer heal as he had once healed; that strange power seemed to have, in a large measure, left him.

"May be it's because I am not fit to ha' it," he said sadly. "One who hates his brother whom he has seen deserves no power to bring down healing from the God he has not seen."

The surgeon, who was watching Barnabas dress a wound that had been inflicted by Bill's poker, laughed impatiently.

"That's nonsense, you know," he remarked; but he no longer said, "That's cant".

The preacher's surgery was gentler than the doctor's, which was certainly rough. The man's eye was badly damaged, and the lightest touch caused agony; he turned over on his face with a groan when Barnabas had finished.

"I used to be able to lighten pain more," said Barnabas. "I've often known that, when I've put my hand on one suffering like that, the torment has been stilled for a bit and he's fallen asleep. But I can't do it now!"

"Of course you can't," said the doctor. "You had a sort of mesmeric faculty that you believed miraculous; but your own nervous energy has been pretty well kicked out of you now, and you are ill and weak; and, naturally, you can't play those tricks which, let me tell you, are best left alone at any time. The failure has nothing whatever to do with your morals, it has to do with your body. If you had been the greatest rogue unhung, so long as your iniquities hadn't touched your health, you'd still have possessed that faculty. There was no need to pray about it; or, if you'd prayed to the devil, it would have come to the same thing; except, of course, that people prefer the other arrangement—it's the pleasanter myth of the two."

Barnabas frowned, looking straight in front of him from under his fair eyebrows.

Scepticism was utterly impossible to him; the doctor's remarks could not touch the simplicity of his faith; he had rejoiced in his healing power, but if it had been clearly demonstrated to him a thousand times that his belief in it was a fallacy, the demonstrator would have left him practically much where he had been before.

"The same God as makes souls makes the bodies to 'em, I suppose," he said. "I can't see as it makes the least bit o' difference which the power comes through, sir. It's only 'through' arter all. I fancied it went straight fro' my soul to the sick man's; but you are more larned, and, happen, you know better; happen, as you say, it went fro' my body—it's no matter, is it, so long as it went? It wasn't fro' the devil, I know, because it was good and healed; I never heard as he did that; he destroys both soul and body. I've never prayed to him," said the preacher, giving the doctor's words a literal interpretation that half amused, half irritated his companion; "but you're wrong when you say it 'ud ha' come to the same thing."

"Oh, you think that the supernatural supply would have dried up, eh?" said Dr. Merrill. The preacher's reply took him by surprise.

"No; I'd not say that for sartain," he said, after a moment's reflection. "If ye mean the power—God doan't stop our breath when we use it to deny and blaspheme Him. If He did, I'd ha' been dead in my boyhood, and ye'd not ha' it now. Happen the power would ha' come just th' same (though I ain't sure about it), like the breath; but it 'ud ha' made a difference. Ha' ye never seen a man using God's gifts for th' devil's service? I have. Ay, an' so have ye, an' ye know too, that he'd better be dead than do it! As for supernatural, I doan't ever understan' what people mean by that. If it means fro' above—why, everything is that; I can't see the thing as isn't—unless it's fro' below," said the preacher, still frowning. "Happen ye can explain it to me."

The doctor shook his head.

"No," he said, "you're right. There's nothing especially supernatural in your creed, Thorpe; because, as you say, it's all that; nor in mine, because it's none of it; so we'll leave the term to the great majority, who are neither fish, fowl, nor good red herring. Anyhow, you've got a marvellous knack with your fingers, whether it comes from heaven or hell, and I suppose you'll swear it must be one or t'other! It's pretty to see how quickly you bandage. It's not every doctor who would let you try your hand like this," said the surgeon, who was rather proud of his liberality. "But I like to see uncommon talent, even in a quack. It's a pity it's mixed with superstition. Now look here; Hopping Jack's sight is gone, and no amount of praying can possibly bring it back to this eye, as I can prove to you in a moment."

The unfortunate Jack swore under his breath, when the surgeon turned his face to the light again.

"Let him alone, sir," said the preacher quickly. "There's no need to touch him again. Oh, ay, I've no sort o' doubt ye know a deal more nor I do; if ye put your power down to th' same source, happen ye'd be a bit tenderer in your way o' using it; ye say it 'ud come to the same, but some o' your patients 'ud feel a difference."

The doctor shrugged his shoulders; if any one but Barnabas Thorpe had commented on his want of feeling, and infliction of pain not always necessary, he would have snubbed him ruthlessly; but, with the evidence before him of a disregard to personal injury, that had wrung genuine admiration from him, he couldn't accuse the preacher of undue and effeminate softness.

He was not naturally cruel; but a man must be upheld by an uncommonly high aim if he can work constantly among brutal and debased natures without either giving way to despair or hardening his heart.

There was a story current in the prison about his having got a man off hanging on condition of his being allowed to try a new operation on him. He was no philanthropist, but he was fond of his profession and a great experimenter; there was not a rogue in Newgate but had a wholesome awe of the little red-haired surgeon.

Hopping Jack was actually grateful to Barnabas.

"It's a case of 'when the devil was ill,'" Dr. Merrill said. "He won't listen to you when he can do without your bandaging, Thorpe! He'll be able to mimic you to the life by the time he's up again—drawl and all."

"But that won't drive me to hold my tongue," said Barnabas smiling.

And, as it happened, the doctor was wrong. Hopping Jack refrained from caricaturing the preacher, even when he got better.

"It ain't that I couldn't!" he said regretfully to Barnabas. "I could do you now as you wouldn't know which was yourself! you're easy to take off; and I could twist 'em all round to listen to me—every man Jack of 'em; but I won't."

"Ye'd be playing a scurvy trick," said Barnabas; "an' in Satan's service. He's a bad paymaster."

Jack winked with the one eye left.

"Gammon! It ain't for that that I don't do it," he said. "Your Master lets you go to gaol too, don't He? you ain't a bit better off for Him. No, it ain't for that, nor for the sake of the stuff you talk. I've heard all that before. But you had a fine chance to pay me out for the game I started in the yard; and you didn't take it—quite contrariwise; and that sticks in my throat, for I tell you I felt pretty sick when the doctor, d——n him, called you in."

"Why, man, what did you suppose I'd do?" said Barnabas. "Ye needn't be grateful to me for not behaving like a devil."

In his most unregenerate days he could never have revenged himself in cold blood on a defenceless and suffering creature. The idea was so utterly abhorrent to him that he felt disgusted at the suggestion, and even at the gratitude that took for granted that he might have been tempted in such wise.

Hopping Jack laughed hoarsely, and said he knew what he'd have done if he'd got a cove who'd broken his ribs under his thumb. But, apparently, from that hour he looked upon the preacher as belonging to a different species, and placed in him an implicit trust that was not without pathos.

When the time of the sessions drew near he became alternately wildly flighty and deeply despondent,—the former being his ordinary condition, the latter only occasional.

He was superstitious, and had a deep-seated belief in luck, which had failed him of late; when the despondent phase was on, he became rather dangerous both to himself and to others.

Physical pain added largely to his depression, for he still suffered from the injury to his eye. Barnabas felt the responsibility, that always drove him to do his utmost, doubly great, because this waggish scamp, who was the approved "funny man" of Newgate, evinced at times a strong, almost dog-like affection for him. But Jack was not the only one among all that miserable crew who appealed strongly to Barnabas Thorpe's ruling passion to "save".

After all, the reckless licence, the apparently brutal callousness, and shameful blasphemy that reigned in the wards were heightened and partially excused by the fact that half these men felt the shadow of the gallows on them; with such a spectre in the corner they drank deep and laughed loudly, lest it should grow too plain. "Oh, it ain't come to that yet," one of them said, shuddering, in answer to an entreaty of the preacher to pause and think. "I ain't got to the thinkin' time."

Yet, on the whole, Barnabas influenced them. The prison chaplain had given up the press yard as a bad job; but then the chaplain had a good many interests which were quite as important to him as the "converting" of sinners. Barnabas was a man of one idea: even where the woman he loved was concerned, he would have deliberately advised her to lay down her bodily life, as she had laid down her position and worldly wealth, if that could, by any possibility, have seemed necessary for the furtherance of Christ's kingdom; and his extreme singleness of aim told, as it always must, whether the aim is high or low. It is possible indeed that his very limitations made him the more effective. The men who see many sides of a question are chary of spilling their blood. The liberal-minded philosophers have their place in the world, but they can't rescue those who are sinking; they can only explain why they sink—which, no doubt, is equally useful.

Those Newgate sermons were preached with the intense fervour of one who believed that the "night was soon coming" for many of his hearers. But the constant strain on mind and body was growing more evident: the preacher was no longer the man he had been when he had first entered Newgate, and protested so vigorously against the iniquities of the press yard; he had grown quite grey in these three months, and his broad shoulders were bowed.

Dr. Merrill was moved to violent indignation on the subject. It was sheer waste of the most magnificent constitution he had ever come across, he said; and Barnabas Thorpe was innocent. Barnabas himself was not indignant; his was not the sort of nature that turns sour in adversity. He generally took things simply, with few questionings as to the why and wherefore; but the hopefulness that had characterised him as to his own prospects rather failed about this time.

"It's allus afore seemed to me most like that I'd get what I wanted, for I used to feel somehow that there was such a deal o' pushin' power in wanting," he said once. "Two months back I hadn't a doubt but what I'd be proved clear; but I doan't know now. Arter all, when I come to think, I've never had what I've most set my heart on for my own sake, though I've been helped in my work. Some people want sunshine, and some are coarser natured, maybe, and best managed t'other way. Happen I won't be proved innocent; happen I'm the sort as is best without much satisfaction. But it seems as if that 'ud be hard on my wife, for she's quite a different make to me, and a much finer; and I can't somehow think as she needs sorrow. My poor little lass! she's had enough."

The very tone of the remark showed how the natural buoyant spirit had been knocked out of him; though his passion for working in season and out of season was even stronger than before.

He was gentler than he had been; and the most miserable turned to him with an instinctive hope that the mercy of heaven might possibly, after all, be as deep as the mercy of this man, even if equally uncompromising. He saw Margaret seldom now. He often was not fit to stand at the grating; and, moreover, he feared that these unsatisfactory meetings were almost more pain than pleasure to his darling.

Early in November, Hopping Jack, together with three accomplices, was tried, and condemned to death; but while the sentence of hanging was recorded oftener then than it is at present, there was also a greater probability of getting off. In nine cases out of ten the sentence was successfully appealed against; and the tenth man probably suffered the extreme penalty as an "example," at times when there was a scare about the especial sin he was condemned for.

Unfortunately for Jack, the crime in which he had been taken red-handed was rife just then; and the public hot against that class of evil-doers.

The agony of suspense was consequently sharp enough; and Barnabas in his heart hoped that a juster judge than any earthly one would not hold the poor wretch guilty for the mad outbreaks that characterised this awful time of waiting for the result of the appeal. Surely no one had the right to inflict a six weeks' torture of uncertainty! He succeeded with much difficulty in getting Jack off an imprisonment in the dark cell. He felt convinced that the dark would drive the man out of his remaining senses. After that, he held himself accountable for Jack's vagaries, and very frequently managed to restrain them. The doctor, at the preacher's earnest entreaty, declared the culprit an "unfit subject" for solitary confinement in utter darkness.

"Though, mind you, he's an equally 'unfit subject' for association with his fellows in the light," he remarked to Barnabas. "They'd much better put him out of the world as soon and as quickly as possible. He's one of nature's mistakes, and you had better not have mercy on mistakes, Thorpe, as you ought to know." A piece of advice that had been given before, with equal want of effect!

The wardsman liked Barnabas none the better for this second interference; but it did not at first occur to the preacher that he was being purposely ill-treated when his food was scantier than it ought to have been, when his gruel was handed to him in a pail, instead of a basin, and when he was carefully excluded from a share of the fire.

When he did discover that these paltry revenges were constant and unremitting, and likely to continue, unless he paid the ward dues, he took no notice of them. There was, certainly, a strong vein of the family obstinacy in Barnabas, and he wasn't going to "give in" to an illegal extortion simply because he was rather colder, hungrier, and more uncomfortable than need be.

The worst days of Newgate, when a gaoler could actually torture or flog a rebellious prisoner, were happily past, and he had too much sturdy pride to complain to the authorities of such mean and petty indignities as he endured, but they probably affected his broken health; and that November was bitterly cold.

He had never in his life before suffered from weather; but he suffered terribly now, both by day and night. The rugs that covered the men were never washed, and he had resolved to prefer comparative cleanliness and cold to unmitigated dirt, and was very angry with his own softness for feeling the frost, "like a woman". Indeed, in his ordinary health it would have done him no harm; but, unfortunately, his bones had not recovered from the violent handling they had received, and he lay awake pretty constantly with racking rheumatic pains in them, and began to stoop like a man of sixty.

At last, towards the end of the month, his turn came.

The case had roused wide interest, both actors in it having already, in widely different ways, made a certain amount of sensation in London. The court was full, and the crowd outside dense.

More than one glance was directed curiously at the preacher's wife, who stood among the spectators, and was quite unconscious of criticism or interest, whether kindly or adverse. Margaret stood between Tom Thorpe and Dr. Merrill; but her whole attention was concentrated on Barnabas. This sea of upturned faces was nothing to her.

George Sauls, looking over the heads of the crowd, caught a glimpse of her, and bit his lip with a sensation of sharp pain, and of something very like envy. He would almost have exchanged places with the prisoner, if by so doing he could make that one woman look at him thus with all her soul in her eyes. That which he could not have, that which would never be his, seemed to him at that moment to loom large and clear, to be the only reality in a world of shadows. He told himself that he was mad, quite mad, and that it was lucky for him that his madness could take no effect. He told himself that this woman was only like other women; that even if her heart could be turned to him by some magic, if he could give all his ambitions and all his wealth in exchange for her, he would wake, when his dream should be over, and regret the bargain. He told himself that he knew what this was made of; that he had been "in love" before now. But the odd part of it was that he did not know.

If the wickedness of our own hearts sometimes takes us by surprise, so, I think, does their goodness. Mr. Sauls had a constitutional dislike to mysteries, and preferred thinking about what he could understand; but there were elements in his love for Meg which would astonish him yet.

Meanwhile, this story that the counsel for the prosecution was telling was not a particularly pleasant one for Mrs. Thorpe to hear; though it was absolutely necessary that it should be told. George Sauls' expression grew stolid and impenetrable as he listened. He was already low in her estimation. Very well: she should have the satisfaction of knowing that her estimate was right, and he would have the satisfaction of seeing Barnabas Thorpe hang.

The counsel dwelt on the enmity that had existed between the prosecutor and the prisoner,—an enmity that he described as being, on the prisoner's side, passionate and unrestrained, and almost bordering on monomania. He should call two witnesses to the fact of Barnabas Thorpe's having already attempted Mr. Sauls' life fifteen years before this last outrage. He spoke of that scene in the churchyard where not even the presence of death had availed to quell the prisoner's mad passion.

Neither the futility of such a wild act of vengeance, nor the indecency of brawling over a newly made grave, had had power to restrain him then: the same violent impulse had evidently possessed him again in later life, when no friendly hands were present to hold him back. He went on to describe how the two men had met again in the hay-field, where the preacher had denounced Mr. Sauls as "unfit to sit at table with Mrs. Thorpe," and when Mr. Sauls had suggested that the preacher had better try to "bring him to repentance" when Mrs. Thorpe was not by. A farm labourer, who would be called to give evidence, had overheard that interview.

Then he told how Mr. Sauls had started on his walk to N——town, following a track that lay across the marshes. This track led only to Caulderwell Farm, and was little frequented. He was followed by his enemy. Mr. Sauls openly acknowledged that he had done his best, on this occasion, to provoke a quarrel. He had demanded an explanation of the words that the preacher had used in the hay-field, and had asked tauntingly whether Barnabas Thorpe only preached "when sheltered by petticoats". Close on this scene followed the tragic and nearly fatal crime for which Barnabas Thorpe stood arraigned. The preacher and Mr. Sauls had parted in anger; Mr. Sauls had gone but a short distance when he was struck to the ground by a blow on the back of his head. Mr. Sauls did not see his assailant, but the facts of the case spoke for themselves. Crimes of violence were rare in that part of the country. Mr. Sauls was a stranger in N——town. He was not aware that any man, with the exception of the preacher, bore him, or had reason to bear him, a grudge. Whoever had struck the blow had meant to kill, and had all but accomplished the fulfilment of his desire. Tom Thorpe, who had found the prosecutor unconscious and hurt nigh to death, and the doctor who was in attendance on him, would be called as witnesses.

The prisoner listened to the speech for the prosecution with a curiously composed air. Once only, when the counsel described the meeting on the marsh, his brows contracted with momentary anxiety. A minute later he raised his head and looked hard at George Sauls. He was glad that that gentleman had had the grace to keep Margaret's name out of the affair. His eyes met his accuser's, and, oddly enough, for a single moment, in the midst of this trial, which was for the life of one of them, these two were of the same mind.

When the witnesses for the prosecution were called, the prisoner's interest seemed to lapse. He nodded reassuringly to poor old Giles, who was heartbroken at having to give evidence against him, but otherwise he paid little heed to what was going on. He was physically exhausted, which partly accounted for his apathy, and he had made up his mind to let things take their course. He had absolutely refused to allow Margaret to employ counsel on his behalf, but he had very little fear as to the result of the trial. His defence was in "the hands of the Lord"; he would "bide quiet," and leave it there. Meg had found it vain to attempt to shake this resolution. Barnabas had a prejudice against lawyers, and his prejudices were not easily removed, but he had also a more reasonable ground for refusing their aid. He hated half measures, and felt that there was little use in telling half a story, while he was bound in honour not to tell the whole. In the absence of counsel, he made one short and trenchant remark on his own behalf.

"If I had meant to kill Mr. Sauls, there'd ha' been no need for me to come behind an' hit i' th' dark," he said. "I should ha' done it face to face, for I was a bit th' stronger o' th' two then; an', if ye ask him, he'll bear me out there. I'm not generally scared o' fair fighting."

There was a little hastily suppressed murmur in the court at the last words.

The story of the middle yard had somehow got about. No one doubted the truth of that last statement. The man's voice was low and his speech as short as could well be, but his bowed shoulders and whitened hair spoke for him. Margaret turned to the red-haired doctor with a proud smile on her white lips.

"They'll have to believe him," she said; and the doctor laughed grimly. "He had better have all Newgate into the witness box!"

But indeed there was no need for the denizens of Newgate to testify to the preacher's character. Honest men there were in plenty who were more than ready with their evidence. Barnabas called three only; but one of the most distinctive features of the trial was the crowd of would-be witnesses who clamoured outside the police court, begging, and sometimes threatening in their eagerness, "to say a word" for the accused. "I know that the preacher never murdered any one or tried to—why? 'Cos he cured my baby when it was chokin' with croup; and I've trudged seven miles to say so," said one draggled, tired-out woman, who could not be persuaded to see that her baby's life had no possible connection with the case.

"Ye've tuk oop th' wrong soart, an' I've summat to say to th' judge abeawt th' preacher. Thae knows he tented me through the black fever an'——What? ye won't let me in? The judge is a fule man!" cried a sturdy and irate countryman, who was convinced that his not being allowed to storm the witness box was a proof of the gross miscarriage of justice. Men actually fought to get into the already over-crowded court. The testimony as to the preacher's character from east and west and north and south was simply overpowering.

Margaret lingered to shake hands with more than one friend of the preacher's when she left the heated court at the end of the first day of the trial.

"When my husband is free again, he will thank you himself," she said. And the men drew back to let her pass, with little murmurs of sympathy. Tom Thorpe was still on one side of her, and the prison doctor on the other.

"Ye'd better get out o' this as quick as ye can," Tom cried; but Meg, who usually shrank from contact with strangers, was in no hurry now. The shouts for Barnabas and the groans for Mr. Sauls made her blood tingle. The sharp anxiety at her heart hurt less when she was in the midst of those excited partisans. She had smiled bravely whenever Barnabas had looked at her, but the sight of him had awakened a passion of indignation that she dreaded being alone with. She wished she could have stayed in the midst of a crowd till the second day's trial should begin. Tom was excited too; his deep-set eyes were glowing, and he hurried her on almost roughly.

"Look 'ee," he said, "I'm thinking some o' those lads as came wi' me 'ull mayhap gi'e Mr. Sauls a warm welcome when he comes out; an' I'd like to see it! Just get clear o' th' scrimmage, an' then I'll go back. Lord bless ye! I've been too kind to that gentleman; but now I've seen our lad's face——" His voice choked.

Meg looked first at him, and then at the knot of L——shire men who stood by the door, and whose "warm welcome" was waiting for George Sauls. She felt instinctively that it would be of no avail to plead with Tom. She turned round and caught hold of the doctor; who had, she knew, been kind to her husband.

"They mean to catch Mr. Sauls when he comes out of court," she said rapidly. "He'd better get away by another door, if he can."

The doctor nodded. "Mr. Sauls can generally be trusted to take care of number one," he remarked; "but I'll tell him."

Tom, who heard the words, laughed angrily. For a moment, Dr. Merrill fancied that the preacher's brother was going forcibly to prevent his carrying the message. But, indignant as Tom was, he felt responsible to Barnabas for Margaret, and wouldn't plunge into a row with her hands clinging to his arm.

"That woman will catch it for having prevented him!" thought the doctor. "There's no doubt about it, there is a queer temper in that family."

When they were clear of the crowd, Meg broke the silence.

"You are very angry with me," she said.

Tom's anger would have repelled and frightened her once; but just now she experienced an odd sort of consolation in the intensity of the wrath and grief he felt for his brother's sake. Tom "cared" as no one else did.

"I'm not such a good Christian as ye are," he said. His voice sounded gruff, and he spoke in sharp undertones, turning his head away. He was so angry that he could not trust himself to look at the fair face his brother loved, though he held his anger with a tight rein.

"So ye wouldn't ha' the man as has made our lad look like that—ay, and 'ull hang him, if he can,—so much as scratched, eh? Ye sent to warn him! Good Lord! it's Barnabas' wife as kindly warns Barnabas' murderer! Ye'll forgi'e the man as 'ud like to kill your husband wi' his lyin' tongue, till seventy times seven! I've known ye a bit hard on Barnabas times, but——" He checked himself, and swallowed the rest of that sentence; but the sharp pull up brought the colour to Meg's pale face.

"Oh, ye are right!" he said, after a silence. "An' uncommonly forgiving an' a remarkable good Christian lass, as I said afore; ye are right—only d——n me, if I wouldn't rayther have a sinner for a wife!"

"Ah," said Meg; "but you are giving me credit for more Christianity than I possess." He did look at her then, struck by something strange in her tone. Barnabas' wife was altered too. With that too vivid consciousness of what Barnabas had gone through, burning like fire somewhere at the bottom of her heart, it struck her as almost ludicrous that Tom should suppose she had pity on the preacher's enemy.

"I heard Long John swearing that he'd served with you man and boy for nigh thirty years, and had never in his life seen one of you put out; that, in fact, your mildness as a family was proverbial!" said Margaret. She did not speak like herself, she was like another woman to-day,—older and sterner and less gentle.

"Of course he did," said Tom. "It 'ud ha' been uncommon queer if one o' the L——shire lads as I've licked into shape wi' my own hands didn't swear by us."

"It would," said Meg gravely. "But if you and those same lads had caught and half murdered Mr. Sauls as he left the court, it would be an odd sort of comment on what we've been hearing, wouldn't it? Perhaps, after that, they'd hardly believe in the great gentleness of the Thorpe disposition, or see how unlikely it is that one of you should hit a man with a bill-hook."

Tom stood still in the middle of the road, and caught her arm with a grasp which hurt her, though neither of them was the least aware of that at the moment.

"Ye doan't tell me ye believe he did that?" he said; and she wondered for a moment what he would have done, if she had believed it.

"No—I know the truth," she said. "And, even if he had not told me, I should still have known that it would have been impossible for him to hit unfairly. But it's not in the natural mildness of your temper that I trust, Tom. Barnabas has something more than that."

Tom gave a despairing grunt. "An' the summat more's just his ruin!" he said, letting her go again. "There! I hadn't no kind o' business to ha' spoken rough to 'ee, lass; and Barnabas 'ud not ha' forgi'en me in a hurry, if he'd heard. I meant to ha' been a help to 'ee; but, I think, I'm mazed wi' to-day's work. It were seeing him."

"Yes, yes; I know, Tom," said Meg. "Do you think I don't know how it breaks one's heart to see him like that? But, when we get him safe home again, we will take such care of him! All the care he ever gave me he shall have back with interest. He will be obliged to get strong, for we will nurse him so well." And again the wistful tenderness in her voice struck Tom as something fresh.

"I wish it were Monday!" she said. "There is no doubt that he will be acquitted. Oh, no doubt at all! Didn't you hear that red-haired doctor say so? He said that there was no direct evidence against Barnabas, and that even Mr. Sauls' cleverness could not make an innocent man guilty. Barnabas looked as if he weren't attending; I think he feels that what becomes of him personally is not his business; or else he was too worn out to listen. On Monday it will be over. I wish it were Monday!"

"Ay! it 'ull be over," said Tom; "but what if it's over the wrong way? The devil does win sometimes, lass, whatever Barnabas may say."

"It isn't possible," said Meg. Then the soft curves of her lips straightened. "If the devil wins," she said, "why, then—you may do what you like. You may tear Mr. Sauls to pieces, Tom, and I will stand by, and clap my hands and cry 'well done!'"

"Amen!" said Tom, holding out his hand. He knew now what had changed Barnabas' wife.

They walked on in silence through the darkening street after that, engrossed by their own thoughts. Tom had got a room in the same house as his sister-in-law; he nodded "good-night" absently to her when they reached home. Five minutes later she knocked at his door, and entered his room with a plate in her hands.

"I've brought you something to eat. Do take it, Tom. You've had nothing all day," she said gently.

"I haven't the heart to feast," said Tom. "An' I hate to see ye waiting on me!" But he swallowed the food hastily, seeing that she would take no denial. Meg's sisterly attentions half touched, half irritated him just then. Anxiety always made Tom cross.

"Are ye gadding about again?" he asked, glancing at her bonnet.

"Yes, I am going to Commercial Road," said Meg. "Mr. Potter tells me that he has got some clothes belonging to Barnabas,—a jersey, and a shirt and a cloth cap. I am going to fetch them and take them to the prison to-night. They say the ward is terribly cold."

"I'll go for 'ee," said Tom, getting up and stretching himself. "What way is it, eh?"

"We will both go," said Meg. "I can't sit still." And Tom checked the remonstrance that was on his lips.

"Come along, lass," he said. "Though it's a wonder ye want my company any more! Eh, the wind's blowing wi' ice in it. Come along, if ye will."

"I think I was glad you were angry," said Meg, laughing a little unsteadily, as they went out again.

"It is good to have one of his own people with me. I couldn't have borne to be with any one but you just now. It is you who belong to him."

"Eh? Times are changed, lass," said Tom. "Barnabas would ha' gi'en his ears once to ha' heard ye say that."

"He wouldn't have let me say that I'd cry 'well done' if you revenged yourself on his enemy, though. Tom, I was mad. Forget it, please!"

"Would ye forgive him?" said Tom, looking hard at her. He repeated the question again presently and more insistingly. "Would ye forgive him—if he won?"

"No!" she said. "One may forgive one's own enemies, but I could never forgive those that injure the people I love. It's not in me to be so good as that—I meant what I said. I should have no pity left for him—for it would all be given," said Meg. She pressed her hands tight against her breast as she walked, and her steps quickened so that Tom could hardly keep pace with her. "But, all the same, I would not cry 'well done', and I would do my best to prevent you—for Barnabas' sake."

"Would ye? Ye wouldn't find your preventin' answer twice, my good lass!" said Tom. "Well, I'm glad ye doan't forgive him. It's more natural like. Ye aren't so much like snow and moonshine as ye were. It made me sick when I thought ye were sorry for that man. A woman who can be sorry for her husband's enemy can't care much. I'm glad ye've some flesh and blood in the way you're made!"

"Do you think that I care less than you?" said Meg.

"Than me! ay, it stands to reason——" began Tom, then stopped short. "I wish I'd left that gentleman in the ditch!" he ended with some irrelevance. "I'll never pick up any one again; there's a deal to answer for."

"Barnabas wouldn't wish that," said Meg.

"Barnabas!" he cried. "He doesn't know what's good for him! Oh, ay, I know what ye are going to say. He'll ha' his reward i' the next world; but what do ye think he'll do wi' it? Why, he'll be miserable in a happy place. When Barnabas gets to heaven he'll ha' no peace till he's sent to hell, my dear, nor give the angels peace either. Ay, ye may cry out, Barnabas' wife, but it's true, an' ye'll see it, if ever ye get to heaven too."