and try to win her back to peace. And damme,
sir,' cried Gabriel, 'with your pardon for the word, I'd do the same if
she had married fifty highwaymen in a twelvemonth; and think it in the
Protestant Manual too, though Martha said it wasn't, tooth and nail,
till doomsday!'

If the dark little parlour had been filled with a dense fog, which,
clearing away in an instant, left it all radiance and brightness, it
could not have been more suddenly cheered than by this outbreak on the
part of the hearty locksmith. In a voice nearly as full and round as his
own, Mr Haredale cried 'Well said!' and bade him come away without more
parley. The locksmith complied right willingly; and both getting into a
hackney coach which was waiting at the door, drove off straightway.

They alighted at the street corner, and dismissing their conveyance,
walked to the house. To their first knock at the door there was no
response. A second met with the like result. But in answer to the third,
which was of a more vigorous kind, the parlour window-sash was gently
raised, and a musical voice cried:

'Haredale, my dear fellow, I am extremely glad to see you. How very much
you have improved in your appearance since our last meeting! I never saw
you looking better. HOW do you do?'

Mr Haredale turned his eyes towards the casement whence the voice
proceeded, though there was no need to do so, to recognise the speaker,
and Mr Chester waved his hand, and smiled a courteous welcome.

'The door will be opened immediately,' he said. 'There is nobody but
a very dilapidated female to perform such offices. You will excuse her
infirmities? If she were in a more elevated station of society, she
would be gouty. Being but a hewer of wood and drawer of water, she
is rheumatic. My dear Haredale, these are natural class distinctions,
depend upon it.'

Mr Haredale, whose face resumed its lowering and distrustful look the
moment he heard the voice, inclined his head stiffly, and turned his
back upon the speaker.

'Not opened yet,' said Mr Chester. 'Dear me! I hope the aged soul has
not caught her foot in some unlucky cobweb by the way. She is there at
last! Come in, I beg!'

Mr Haredale entered, followed by the locksmith. Turning with a look of
great astonishment to the old woman who had opened the door, he inquired
for Mrs Rudge--for Barnaby. They were both gone, she replied, wagging
her ancient head, for good. There was a gentleman in the parlour, who
perhaps c