l.

"Well, I was going to say, unless she had an appointment there. But that
does not appear probable for Rachel Frost."

"It is barely possible, let alone probable," was the retort of Mr.
Verner.

"But still, in a case like this, every circumstance must be looked at,
every trifle weighed," resumed Mr. Bitterworth. "Does Rachel's own
conduct appear to you to have been perfectly open? She has been
indulging, it would seem, in some secret grief latterly; has been
'strange,' as one or two have expressed it. Then, again, she stated to
her brother that she was going to stay at Duffs for a gossip, whereas
the woman says she had evidently no intention of gossiping, and barely
gave herself time to order the articles spoken of. Other witnesses
observed her leave Duff's, and walk with a hasty step direct to the
field road, and turn down it. All this does not sound quite clear to
me."

"There was one thing that did not sound clear to me," broke in Lionel
abruptly, "and that was Dinah Roy's evidence. The woman's half a fool;
otherwise I should think she was purposely deceiving us."

"A pity but she could see a real ghost!" cried John Massingbird, looking
inclined to laugh, "It might cure her for fancy ones. She's right in
one thing, however; poor Luke might have got this clapped on his
shoulders had he been here."

"Scarcely," dissented Dr. West. "Luke Roy is too inoffensive to harm any
one, least of all a woman, and Rachel; and that the whole parish knows."

"There's no need to discuss Luke's name in the business," said Mr.
Verner; "he is far enough away. Whoever the man may have been, it was
not Luke," he emphatically added. "Luke would have been the one to
succour Rachel, not to hurt her."

Not a soul present but felt that Mr. Verner spoke in strict accordance
with the facts, known and presumptive. They must look in another quarter
than Luke for Rachel's assailant.

Mr. Verner glanced at Mr. Bitterworth and Dr. West, then at the three
young men before him.

"We are amongst friends," he observed, addressing the latter. "I would
ask you, individually, whether it was one of you that the boy, Duff,
spoke of as being in the lane?"

They positively disclaimed it, each one for himself. Each one mentioned
that he had been elsewhere at the time, and where he had been.

"You see," said Mr. Verner, "the lane leads only to Verner's Pride."

"But by leaping a fence anywhere, or a gate, or breaking through a
hedge, it may lea