d loyal faith for evermore.

And honest Will took it all for gospel, little dreaming what agony of
despair, what fearful suspicions, what bitter prayers, this letter had
cost to the gentle heart of Francis Leigh.

He showed the letter triumphantly to St. Leger; and he was quite wise
enough to gainsay no word of it, at least aloud; but quite wise enough,
also, to believe in secret that Frank looked on the matter in quite a
different light; however, he contented himself with saying:

"The man is an angel as his mother is!" and there the matter dropped for
a few days, till one came forward who had no mind to let it drop, and
that was Jack Brimblecombe, now curate of Hartland town, and "passing
rich on forty pounds a year.

"I hope no offence, Mr. William; but when are you and the rest going
after--after her?" The name stuck in his throat.

Cary was taken aback.

"What's that to thee, Catiline the blood-drinker?" asked he, trying to
laugh it off.

"What? Don't laugh at me, sir, for it's no laughing matter. I drank
that night naught worse, I expect, than red wine. Whatever it was, we
swore our oaths, Mr. Cary; and oaths are oaths, say I."

"Of course, Jack, of course; but to go to look for her--and when we've
found her, cut her lover's throat. Absurd, Jack, even if she were worth
looking for, or his throat worth cutting. Tut, tut, tut--"

But Jack looked steadfastly in his face, and after some silence:

How far is it to the Caracas, then, sir?"

"What is that to thee, man?"

"Why, he was made governor thereof, I hear; so that would be the place
to find her?"

"You don't mean to go thither to seek her?" shouted Cary, forcing a
laugh.

"That depends on whether I can go, sir; but if I can scrape the money
together, or get a berth on board some ship, why, God's will must be
done."

Will looked at him, to see if he had been drinking, or gone mad; but the
little pigs' eyes were both sane and sober.

Will knew no answer. To laugh at the poor fellow was easy enough; to
deny that he was right, that he was a hero and cavalier, outdoing
romance itself in faithfulness, not so easy; and Cary, in the first
impulse, wished him at the bottom of the bay for shaming him. Of
course, his own plan of letting ill alone was the rational, prudent,
irreproachable plan, and just what any gentleman in his senses would
have done; but here was a vulgar, fat curate, out of his senses,
determined not to let ill alone, but to d