s eight shillings to the incumbent. This amount was, as a rule,
remitted punctually by Mr. Soames through the post. On the occasion
now spoken of, he had had some reason to visit Hogglestock, and had
paid the money personally to Mr. Crawley. Of so much there was no
doubt. But he had paid it by a cheque drawn by himself on his own
bankers at Barchester, and that cheque had been cashed in the
ordinary way on the next morning. On returning to his own house in
Barchester he had missed his pocket-book, and had written to Mr
Crawley to make inquiry. There had been no money in it, beyond
the cheque drawn by Lord Lufton for twenty pounds. Mr. Crawley had
answered this letter by another, saying that no pocket-book had been
found in his house. All this had happened in March.

In October, Mrs. Crawley paid twenty pounds to Fletcher, the butcher,
and in November Lord Lufton's cheque was traced back through the
Barchester bank to Mr. Crawley's hands. A brickmaker of Hoggle End,
much favoured by Mr. Crawley, had asked for change over the counter of
this Barchester bank,--not, as will be understood, the bank on which
the cheque was drawn--and had received it. The accommodation had been
refused to the man at first, but when he presented the cheque the
second day, bearing Mr. Crawley's name on the back of it, together
with a note from Mr. Crawley himself, the money had been given for
it; and the identical notes so paid had been given to Fletcher, the
butcher, on the next day by Mrs. Crawley. When inquiry was made, Mr
Crawley stated that the cheque had been paid to him by Mr. Soames, on
behalf of the rentcharge due to him by Lord Lufton. But the error
of this statement was at once made manifest. There was the cheque,
signed by Mr. Soames himself, for the exact amount,--twenty pounds
four shillings. As he himself declared, he had never in his life paid
money on behalf of Lord Lufton by a cheque drawn by his lordship.
The cheque given by Lord Lufton, and which had been lost, had been a
private matter between them. His lordship had simply wanted change
in his pocket, and his agent had given it to him. Mr. Crawley was
speedily shown to be altogether wrong in the statement made to
account for possession of the cheque.

Then he became very moody and would say nothing further. But his
wife, who had known nothing of his first statement when made, came
forward and declared that she believed the cheque for twenty pounds
to be part of a present g