p again. You are the
greatest ass living. Consider yourself dismissed." With those words, and
with an oath to emphasize them, he left the coffee-shop and returned to
the cab.

"She's gone!" cried his father. "Oh, Jemmy, Jemmy, I see it in your
face!" He fell back into his own corner of the cab, with a faint,
wailing cry. "They're married," he moaned to himself; his hands falling
helplessly on his knees; his hat falling unregarded from his head. "Stop
them!" he exclaimed, suddenly rousing himself, and seizing his son in a
frenzy by the collar of the coat.

"Go back to the hotel," shouted Bashwood the younger to the cabman.
"Hold your noise!" he added, turning fiercely on his father. "I want to
think."

The varnish of smoothness was all off him by this time. His temper was
roused. His pride--even such a man has his pride!--was wounded to the
quick. Twice had he matched his wits against a woman's; and twice the
woman had baffled him.

He got out, on reaching the hotel for the second time, and privately
tried the servants with the offer of money. The result of the experiment
satisfied him that they had, in this instance, really and truly no
information to sell. After a moment's reflection, he stopped, before
leaving the hotel, to ask the way to the parish church. "The chance may
be worth trying," he thought to himself, as he gave the address to the
driver. "Faster!" he called out, looking first at his watch, and then at
his father. "The minutes are precious this morning; and the old one is
beginning to give in."

It was true. Still capable of hearing and of understanding, Mr. Bashwood
was past speaking by this time. He clung with both hands to his son's
grudging arm, and let his head fall helplessly on his son's averted
shoulder.

The parish church stood back from the street, protected by gates and
railings, and surrounded by a space of open ground. Shaking off his
father's hold, Bashwood the younger made straight for the vestry. The
clerk, putting away the books, and the clerk's assistant, hanging up a
surplice, were the only persons in the room when he entered it and asked
leave to look at the marriage register for the day.

The clerk gravely opened the book, and stood aside from the desk on
which it lay.

The day's register comprised three marriages solemnized that morning;
and the first two signatures on the page were "Allan Armadale" and
"Lydia Gwilt!"

Even the spy--ignorant as he was of the truth, unsusp