e said, between her teeth.

"You are as hard as a stone," he answered, sullenly, and for some minutes
there was silence between them.

"I suppose you are going to turn me out into the rain again?" asked the
convict.

"You cannot stay here--you are not safe for a minute. You will have to
go. You must come back to-morrow and I will give you the money. You had
better go now--"

"Oh, Mary, I would not have thought it of you," moaned Goddard.

"Why--what else can I do? I cannot let you sleep in the house--I have no
barn. If any one saw you here it would be all over. People know about
it--"

"What people?"

"The vicar and his wife and Mr. Juxon at the Hall."

"Mr. Juxon? What is he like? Would he give me up if he knew?"

"I think he would," said Mary Goddard, thoughtfully. "I am almost sure he
would. He is the justice of the peace here--he would be bound to."

"Do you know him?" Goddard thought he detected a slight nervousness in
his wife's manner.

"Very well. This house belongs to him."

"Oh!" ejaculated the convict. "I begin to see."

"Yes--you see you had better go," said his wife innocently. "How can you
manage to come here tomorrow? You cannot go on without the money--"

"No--and I don't mean to," he answered roughly. Money was indeed an
absolute necessity to him. "Give me what you have got in the house,
anyhow. You may think better of it to-morrow. I don't trust people of
your stamp."

Mary Goddard rose without a word and left the room. When she was gone the
convict set himself to finish the jug of ale she had brought, and looked
about him. He saw objects that reminded him of his former home. He
examined the fork with which he had eaten and remembered the pattern and
the engraved initials as he turned it over in his hand. The very table
itself had belonged to his house--the carpet beneath his feet, the chair
upon which he sat. It all seemed too unnatural to be true. That very
night, that very hour, he must go forth again into the wild February
weather and hide himself, leaving all these things behind him; leaving
behind too his wife, the woman he had so bitterly injured, but who was
still his wife. It seemed impossible. Surely he might stay if he pleased;
it was not true that detectives were on his track--it was all a dream,
since that dreadful day when he had written that name, which was not his,
upon a piece of paper. He had waked up and was again at home. But he
started as he heard a footstep in t