It was noon on that day, the day of the meeting at Riddsley, and Mary was sitting in the parlor at the Gatehouse. She was stooping over the fire with her eyes on the embers. The old hound lay beside her with his muzzle resting on her shoe, and Mrs. Toft, solidly poised on her feet, on the farther side of the table, rolled her apron about her arms and considered the pair.

"It's given us all a rare shock," she said as she marked the girl's listless pose, "the poor Master's death! That sudden and queer, too! I don't know that I'm better for it, myself, and Toft goes up and down like a toad under a harrow, he's that restless! For 'Truria, she's fairly mazed. Her body's here and her thoughts are lord knows where. Toft, he seems to think something will come of her and her reverend----"

"I hope so," Mary said gently.

"But it's beyond me what Toft thinks these days. I asked him point--blank yesterday, 'Toft,' I says, 'are we going or are we staying?' And, bless the man, he looks at me as if he'd eat me. 'Take time and you'll know,' he says. 'But whose is the house?' I asks, 'and who's to pay us?' 'God knows!' he says, and whiffs out of the room like one of these lucifers!"

"I think that the house is Mr. Basset's," Mary explained, "for the rest of the lease; that's about three years."

"But you'll not be staying, begging your pardon, Miss? I suppose you'll be naming the day soon? The Master's gone and his lordship will be wanting you somewhere else than here."

"Yes, Mrs. Toft," Mary said quietly. "I suppose so."

Mrs. Toft looked for a blush and saw none, and she drew her conclusions. She went on another tack. "There's like to be a fine rumpus in the town to-day," she said comfortably. "The Squire's brought a foreigner down to trim their nails, and there's to be a wagon and speaking and such like foolishness at the Maypole. As if all the speeches of all the fools in Staffordshire would lower the quartern loaf! Anyway, if what Petch says is true, the farmers are that mad there's like to be lives lost!"

Mary stooped and carefully put a piece of wood on the fire.

"And, to be sure, they're a rough lot," Mrs. Toft continued, dropping her apron. "I'm not forgetting what happened to the reverend Colet, and I wish the young master safe out of it. It's all give and no take with him, too much for others and too little for himself! I'm thinking if anybody's hurt he'll be there or thereabouts."

Mary turned. "Is Petch--couldn't Petch go down and----"

"La, Miss," Mrs. Toft answered--the girl's face told her all that she wished to know--"Petch don't dare, with his lordship on the other side! But, all said and done, I'll be bound the young master'll come through. It's a pity, though," she continued thoughtfully, as she began to dust the sideboard, "as people don't know their own minds. There's the Squire, now. He's lived quiet and pleasant all these years and now he must dip his nose into this foolishness, same as if he dipped it into hot worts when Toft's a-brewing! I don't know what's come to him. He goes riding up to Blore these winter nights, twenty miles if it's a furlong, when this house is his! He's more like to take his death that way, if I'm a judge."

"Is he doing that?" Mary asked in a small voice.

"To be sure," Mrs. Toft returned. "What else! Which reminds me, Miss, are those papers to go to the bank to-day?"

"I believe so."

"Well, you're looking that peaky, you'd best take a jaunt with them. Why not? It's a fine day, and if there is a bit of a clash there's none will hurt you. Do you go, Miss, and get a little color in your cheeks. At worst, you'll bring back the news and I'm sure we're that dead-alive and moped a little's a godsend!"

"I think I will go," Mary said.

So when the gig, which was to convey the boxes to the bank, arrived about three, she mounted beside the driver. Here, were it only for an hour, was distraction and a postponement of that need to decide, to choose between two courses, which was crushing her under its weight.

For Mary was very unhappy. That moment which had proved to her that she did not love the man she was to marry and did love another, had stamped itself on her memory, never to be wiped from it. In Audley's company, and for a time after they had parted, the shock had numbed her mind and dulled her feelings. But once alone and free to think, she had grasped all that the discovery meant--to her and to him; and from that moment she had not known an instant of ease.

She saw that she had made a terrible mistake, and one so vital that, if nothing could be done, it must wreck her happiness and another's happiness. And what was she to do? What ought she to do? In a moment of emotion, led astray by that love of love which is natural to women, and something swayed--so she told herself in scorn--by

which to women are not shadows, she had made this mistake, and now, self-tricked, she had only herself to blame if

But to see her folly did not avail. What was she to do?

Ought she to tell the truth, however painful it might be, to the man whom she had deceived? Or ought she to go through with it, to do her duty and save him at least from hurt? Either way, she had wrecked her own craft, but she might still hope to save his. Or--might she hope? She was not certain even of this.

What was she to do? Hour after hour she asked herself the question, sometimes looking through the windows with eyes that saw nothing, at others pacing her room in a fever of anxiety. What was she to do? She could not decide. Now she thought one thing, now another. And time was passing. No wonder that she was glad even of the distraction of this journey to Riddsley that at another time had been so dull an adventure! It was, at least, a reprieve, a respite from the burden of decision.

She would not own, even to herself, that she had any other thought in going, or that anxiety had any part in her restlessness. From that side of the battle she turned her eyes with all the strength of her will. Her conduct had been that of a silly girl rather than that of a woman who had seen and suffered; but she was not light--and besides Basset was cured. She was only unfortunate, and desperately unhappy.

As they drove by the old Cross at the foot of the hill she averted her eyes. Surely it must have been in some other life that she had made it the object of a walk, and had told herself that she would never forget it.

Alas, she had been right. She would never forget it!

The man who drove saw that her face matched her mourning, and he left her to her thoughts, so that hardly a word passed between them until they were close upon the outskirts of the town. Then the driver, to whom the dull winter landscape, the lines of willows, and the low water-logged fields, were no novelty, pricked up his ears.

"Dang me!" he said, "they've started! There's a fine rumpus in the town. Do you hear 'em, Miss? That's a band I'm thinking?"

"I hope no one will be hurt."

The man winked at his horse. "None of the right side, Miss," he said slyly. "But it might be a hanging, front o' Stafford gaol, by the roar! I met a tidy lot going in as I came out, a right tidy lot! I'm blest," after listening a moment, "if they're not coming this way!"

"I hope they won't do anything to----"

"La, Miss," the man answered, misreading her anxiety and interrupting her, "they'll never touch us. And for the old nag, he's yeomanry. He'd not start if he met a mile o' funerals!"

Certainly the noise was growing. But the lift of the canal bridge and bank, which crossed the road a hundred yards before them, hid all of the town from them save a couple of church towers, some tiled roofs, and the brick gable of Hatton's Works. The man whipped up his horse.

"Teach they Manchester chaps a trick!" he muttered. "Shouldn't wonder if there'll be work for the crowner out of this! Gee-up, old nag, let's see what's afoot! 'Pears to me," as the shouting grew plainer, "we'll be in at the death yet, Miss!"

Mary winced at the word, but if the man feared that she would refuse to go on, he was mistaken. On the contrary, she looked eagerly to the front as the old horse, urged by the whip, took the rise of the bridge at a canter, and, having reached the crown, relapsed into an absent-minded walk.

"Dang me!" cried the driver, greatly excited, "but they do mean business! It's in knee in neck with 'em! Never thought it would come to this. And who is't they've got, Miss?"

Certainly there was something out of the common on foot. Moving to meet the gig, and filling the road from ditch to ditch, appeared a disorderly crowd of two or three hundred persons. Cheering, hooting, and brandishing sticks, they came on at something between a walk and a run, although in the heart of the mass there was a something that now and again checked the movement, and once brought it to a stand. When this happened the crowd eddied and flowed about the object in its centre and presently swept on again with the same hooting and laughter.

But in the laughter, as in the hooting, there was, after each of these pauses, a more savage note.

"What is it?" Mary cried, as the driver, scared by the sight, pulled up his horse. "What is it?"

"D--n me," the man replied, forgetting his manners, "if I don't think it's Ben Bosham they've got! It is Ben! And they're for ducking him! It's mortal deep by the bridge there, and s'help me, if it's not ten to one they drown him!"

"Ben Bosham?" Mary repeated. Then she recalled the name. She remembered what Mrs. Toft had said of him--that the man had a wife and would bring her to ruin. The crowd was not fifty yards from them now and was still coming on. To the left a track ran down to the towing-path and the canal, and already the leaders of the mob were swerving in that direction. As they did so--and were once more checked for a moment--Mary espied among them a man's bald head twisting this way and that, as he strove to escape. The man was struggling desperately, his clothes almost torn from his back, but he was helpless in the hands of a knot of stout fellows, and after a brief resistance he was hauled forcibly on. A hundred jeering voices rose about him, and a something cruel in the sound chilled Mary's blood. The dreary scene, the sluggish canal, the flat meadows, the rising mist, all pressed on her mind and deepened the note of tragedy.

But on that she broke the spell. The blood in her spoke. She clutched the driver's arm and shook it. "Go on!" she cried. "Go on! Drive into them!"

The man hesitated--he saw that the crowd was in no jesting mood. But the old horse felt the twitch on the reins and started, and having the slope with him, trotted gently forward as if the road were empty before him. The crowd waved and shouted, and cursed the driver. But the horse, thinking perhaps that this was some new form of parade, only cocked his ears and ambled on till he reached the foremost. Then a man seized the rein, jerked it, and stopped him.

In a moment Mary sprang down, heedless of the fact that she was one woman among a hundred men. She faced the crowd, her eyes bright with indignation. "Let that man go," she cried. "Do you hear? Do you want to murder him?" And, advancing a step, she laid her hand on Ben Bosham's ragged, filthy sleeve--he had been down more than once and been rolled in the mud. "Let him go!" she continued imperiously. "Do you know who I am, you cowards? Let him go!"

"Yah!" shouted the crowd, and drowned her voice and pressed roughly about her, threatened her. One of the foremost asked her what she would do, another cried that she had best make herself scarce! Furious faces surrounded her, fists were shaken at her. But Mary was not daunted. "If you don't let him go, I shall go to Lord Audley!" she said.

"You're a fool meddling in this!" cried a voice. "We're only going to wash the devil!"

"You will let him go!" she replied, facing them all without fear and, advancing a step, she actually plucked the man from the hands that held him. "I am Miss Audley! If you do not let him go----"

"We're only going to wash him, lady," whined one of the men who held him.

"That's all, lady!" chimed in half-a-dozen. "He wants it!"

But Ben was not of that opinion, or he did not value cleanliness. "They're going to drown me!" he spluttered, his eyes wild. All the fight had been knocked out of him. "They're paid to do it! They'll drown me!"

"And sarve him right!" shouted half-a-dozen at the rear of the crowd. "Sarve him right, the devil!"

"They will not do it!" Mary said firmly. "They'll not lay another hand on you. Get in! Get in here!" And then to the crowd, "For shame!" she cried. "Stand back!"

The man was so shaken that he could not help himself, but she pushed, the driver pulled, and in a trice, before the mob had recovered from its astonishment, Ben was above their heads, on the seat of the gig--a blubbering, ragged, mud-caked figure with a white face and bleeding lips. "Go on!" Mary said in the same tone, and the gig moved forward, the old yeomanry horse tossing its head. She moved on beside it with her hand on the rail.

The mob let them pass, but closed in behind them, and after a pause began to jeer--a little in amusement, a little to cover its defeat. In a moment farce took the place of tragedy; the danger was over. "We'll tell your wife, Ben!" screamed a youth, and the crowd laughed and followed. Other wits took their turn. "You'll want a new coat for the wedding, Ben!" cried one. And now and again amid the laughter a sterner note survived. "We'll ha' you yet, Ben!" a man would cry. "You're not out of the wood yet, Ben!"

Mary's face burned, but she stuck to her post, plodding on beside the gig, and after this fashion the queer procession, heralded by a score of urchins crying the news, entered the streets of the town. On either side women thronged the doorways and steps, and while some cried, "Bravo, Miss!" others laughed and called to their neighbors to come out and see the sight. And still the crowd clung to the rear of the gig, and hooted and laughed and pretended to make forays on it.

Mary had hoped to shake them off, but as they persisted in following and no relief came--for Basset and his rescue party had gone to the canal by another road--she saw nothing for it but to go on to Lord Audley's. With a curt word she made the man turn that way.

The crowd still attended, curious, amused. It had doubled its numbers, nay, had trebled them. There were friends as well as foes among them now, some of Hatton's men, some of Banfield's, yellow favors as well as blue. If Mary had known it, she might have set Ben down and not a hand would have been laid upon him. Even the leaders of the riot were now thankful that they had not carried the matter farther. Enough had been done.

But Mary did not know this. She thought that the man was still in peril. She did not dream of leaving him. And it was at the head of a crowd of three or four hundred of the riff-raff of Riddsley that she broke in upon the quiet of the suburban road in which The Butterflies stood. Tumultuously, followed by laughter and hooting and cheers, she swept along it with her train, and came to a halt before the house.

No house was ever more surprised. Mrs. Wilkinson's scared face peered above one blind, her sisters' caps showed above another. Was it an accident? Was it a riot? Was it a Puseyite protest? What was it? Every servant, every neighbor, Lord Audley himself came to the windows.

Mary signed to the driver to help Ben down, and the moment the man's foot touched the ground she grasped his arm. With a burning face, but with her head in the air, she guided his stumbling footsteps through the gate and along the paved walk. They came together to the door. They went in.

The crowd formed up five deep along the railings, and waited in wondering silence to see what would happen. What would his lordship say? What would his lordship do? This was bringing the election to his doors with a vengeance, and there were not a few of the better sort who saw the fun of the situation.