f how it would be if he and Tom did so,
and went there to live; and when he had debated it well, he asked
himself what would be the use, and confessed that it would be all
nonsense, and that he had been thinking like a child.

"No," he said; "I'm no baby now. All this has made a man of me, and Tom
Tallington is right; we must go and begin life somewhere else--where the
world will not be so hard."

"He will not be here for an hour yet," he thought; so he employed
himself very busily in putting together the few things he meant to take
on his journey into that little-known place beyond the fen, where there
were big towns, and people different to themselves; and as Dick packed
his bundle he tried to keep back a weak tear or two which would gather
as if to drop on the lavender-scented linen, that reminded him of her
who had that night called him her boy.

But there was a stubborn feeling upon him which made him viciously knot
together the handkerchief ends of his bundle, and then go and stand at
the window and watch and listen for the coming of Tom.

For he had made up his mind to go with Tom if he came, without him if he
failed, for he told himself the world elsewhere would not be so hard.

One hour--two hours passed. He heard them strike on the old eight-day
clock below. But no Tom.

Could he have repented and made up his mind not to keep faith, or was
there some reason?

Never mind, he would go alone and fight the world, and some day people
would be sorry for having suspected him as they did now.

He laughed bitterly, and stepped to the open window bundle in hand. He
had but to swing himself out and drop to the ground, and trudge away
into that romantic land--the unknown. Yes, he would go. "Good-bye,
dear mother; father, good-bye!" he whispered softly; and the next moment
one foot was over the window-sill, and he was about to drop, when a
miserably absurd sound rose on the midnight air, a sound which made him
dart back into his room like some guilty creature, as there rang out the
strange cry:

"He--haw, he--haw!" as dismal a bray as Solomon had ever uttered in his
life; and for no reason whatever, as it seemed, Dick Winthorpe went back
and sat upon his bed thinking of the wheelwright's words:

That if he went away people would declare he fired the shot.

"I can't help it," cried Dick at last, after an hour's bitter struggle
there in the darkness of the night; and once more he ran to the window,
meaning