was able to speak the truth, beheld Richard's face blackening
at him, and swallowed back half the word.

"The ploughman!" Adrian took him up cheerily. "Then we have here a
ploughman out of employ. Given a ploughman out of employ, and a rick
burnt. The burning of a rick is an act of vengeance, and a ploughman out
of employ is a vengeful animal. The rick and the ploughman are advancing
to a juxtaposition. Motive being established, we have only to prove their
proximity at a certain hour, and our ploughman voyages beyond seas."

"Is it transportation for rick-burning?" inquired Ripton aghast.

Adrian spoke solemnly: "They shave your head. You are manacled. Your diet
is sour bread and cheese-parings. You work in strings of twenties and
thirties. ARSON is branded on your backs in an enormous A. Theological
works are the sole literary recreation of the well-conducted and
deserving. Consider the fate of this poor fellow, and what an act of
vengeance brings him to! Do you know his name?"

"How should I know his name?" said Richard, with an assumption of
innocence painful to see.

Sir Austin remarked that no doubt it would soon be known, and Adrian
perceived that he was to quiet his line, marvelling a little at the
baronet's blindness to what was so clear. He would not tell, for that
would ruin his influence with Richard; still he wanted some present
credit for his discernment and devotion. The boys got away from dinner,
and, after deep consultation, agreed upon a course of conduct, which was
to commiserate with Farmer Blaize loudly, and make themselves look as
much like the public as it was possible for two young malefactors to
look, one of whom already felt Adrian's enormous A devouring his back
with the fierceness of the Promethean eagle, and isolating him forever
from mankind. Adrian relished their novel tactics sharply, and led them
to lengths of lamentation for Farmer Blaize. Do what they might, the hook
was in their gills. The farmer's whip had reduced them to bodily
contortions; these were decorous compared with the spiritual writhings
they had to perform under Adrian's manipulation. Ripton was fast becoming
a coward, and Richard a liar, when next morning Austin Wentworth came
over from Poer Hall bringing news that one Mr. Thomas Bakewell, yeoman,
had been arrested on suspicion of the crime of Arson and lodged in jail,
awaiting the magisterial pleasure of Sir Miles Papworth. Austin's eye
rested on Richard as he spoke