the old home.

For a couple of days after the return of the miller with his daughter
and son, very little was said about the past;--very little, at
least, in which either the father or Sam took any part. Between the
two sisters there were no doubt questions and answers by the hour
together as to every smallest detail of the occurrences at Salisbury.
And the mother almost sang hymns of joy over her child, in that the
hour which she had so much dreaded had passed by. But the miller said
not a word;--and Sam was almost equally silent. "But it be all over,
Sam?" asked his mother, anxiously one day. "For certain sure it be
all over now?"

"There's one, mother, for whom it ain't all over yet;--poor devil."

"But he was the--murderer, Sam."

"So was t'other fellow. There weren't no difference. If one was more
spry to kill t'old chap than t'other, Acorn was the spryest. That's
what I think. But it's done now, and there ain't been much justice in
it. As far as I sees, there never ain't much justice. They was nigh
a-hanging o' me; and if those chaps had thought o' bringing t'old
man's box nigh the mill, instead of over by t'old woman's cottage,
they would a hung me;--outright. And then they was twelve months
about it! I don't think much on 'em." When his mother tried to
continue the conversation,--which she would have loved to do with
that morbid interest which we always take in a matter which has been
nearly fatal to us, but from which we have escaped,--Sam turned into
the mill, saying that he had had enough of it, and wouldn't have any
more.

Then, on the third day, a report of the trial in a county newspaper
reached them. This the miller read all through, painfully, from the
beginning to the end, omitting no detail of the official occurrences.
At last, when he came to the account of Sam's evidence, he got up
from the chair on which he was sitting close to the window, and
striking his fist upon the table, made his first and last comment
upon the trial. "It was well said, Sam. Yes; though thou be'est my
own, it was well said." Then he put the paper down and walked out of
doors, and they could see that his eyes were full of tears.

But from that time forth there came a great change in his manner to
his youngest daughter. "Well, Carry," he would say to her in the
morning, with as much outward sign of affection as he ever showed to
any one; and at night, when she came and stood over him before he
lifted his weary limbs out