to come over
the weary lad, and he was fast dropping off to sleep,
when--_Cock-a-doodle-doo_!

A shrill and sonorous challenge came from one of the lodges, which made
Dick start and throw one leg out of bed, sit up, and throw himself down
again.

"Ugh! you stupid!" he cried angrily. "I don't believe I've been asleep
yet."

He seized his pillow, gave it a few savage punches, and lay down again,
but only to find himself more wakeful than ever, with the unpleasant
feeling that he was suspected of fighting against his father's plans;
and after turning the matter over and over, and asking himself whether
he should go straight to his father in the morning and tell him, or
whether he should make Mr Marston his confidant, he came to the
conclusion that he should not like to, for it might make them
suspicious, and think that he really was concerned in the case.

Then he resolved to tell Hickathrift and ask his advice, or Dave, or
John Warren.

Lastly, he resolved to tell his mother; and as he thought of how she
would take his hand and listen to him attentively, and give him the best
of counsel, he asked himself why he had not thought of her before.

But he grew more hot and uncomfortable, thinking till his troubled brain
seemed to get everything in a knot, and he had just come to the
conclusion that he would say nothing to anybody, for the constable's
suspicions were not worth notice, when there was a sharp rap on the
floor as if something had fallen, and he lay listening with every sense
on the strain.

He had not long to wait, for from beneath his window came a low familiar
whistle.

"Why, it's Tom!" he thought, starting up in bed; and as he was in the
act of gliding out, a second thought troubled him--Tom there in the
middle of the night! And if the squire heard him he would believe they
were engaged in some scheme.

"Tom!" he whispered, as he leaned out of the open window.

"Yes. May I come up?"

"No, don't. What do you want? Why have you come over?"

"Nobody knows I've come. I got out of the bed-room window and ran
across."

"What for?"

"I can't tell you down here, Dick; I must come up."

He ran away softly over the grass, and came back in a few minutes with
one of the short ladders, of whose whereabouts he knew as well as Dick,
and planting it against the window-sill, he ran up and thrust in his
head.

"I say, Dick," he whispered, "I couldn't sleep to-night, and I went to
the window and look