better and saw the end from the beginning."

"Providence shan't be forgot," promised Nicky. "I'll turn over a new leaf
and even go to chapel I shouldn't wonder--after I've done in William
Westaway."

III

They spent that night at Plymouth, and she made Nicky scrap his clothes
and get a new fit out; and the next day she took him home. No doubt her
yellow cat was terrible pleased to see the pair of 'em; but the
home-coming had its funny side too, for none marked them arrive--'twas
after dark when they did so--and they'd only just finished their meal,
when come heavy footsteps up the path, and Jenny well knew the sound of
'em.

"'Tis Bill Westaway!" she said. "He don't know as I've been away and no
doubt he's found what he's pretending to search for. Slip in here, afore I
let him come in, then you'll hear all about yourself."

There was a cupboard one side of the kitchen fireplace, and being quite
big enough to take in Spider, he crept there, and his wife put home the
door after him, but left a little space so as he could hear. And then she
went to the cottage door and let in the visitor. 'Twas William sure
enough, and his face was long and melancholy.

"A cruel time I've had--more in the river than out of it," he said. "I'm
bruised and battered and be bad in my breathing parts also along of
exposure and the wet. I dare say I've shortened my life a good bit; but
all that was nothing when I thought of you, Jenny. And now I'm terrible
afraid you must face the worst. I've made a beginning, I'm sorry to say."
He drew a parcel from under his arm and laid out afore her the wreck of a
water-sodden billycock hat, a rag of a dark-blue flannel shirt and one
ginger-coloured sock in a pretty ruinous state.

"What d'you make of these here mournful relics?" he asked. "Without doubt
they once belonged to your Spider, and where I found'em I'm afraid his
poor little bones ain't far off."

"They be even nearer than you think, William Westaway," she said. "In
fact, I've found'em myself."

"Found'em!" he gasped out, glazing with his shifty eyes at her and a
miz-maze of wonder on his face.

"Found'em--not in the Dart neither; but at Meldon Quarry. Nicky is alive
and well, and you know it, and you always knew it. And your day of
reckoning be near!"

She paused. You might have thought she'd expect for her husband to leap
out of the cupboard, but he didn't; he bided close where he was, like a
hare in its form; and she knew he wo