I promise it."

"In the sight of God?" he added, "for I know you."

"Ay." said she, "in the sight of God, since you must have it so."

"Well, then," said he, "the common report is right; the man that
murdhered him is Condy Dalton. I have kept it in till I can bear it no
longer. It's my intention to go to a magistrate's as soon as my face
gets well. For near two-and-twenty years, now, this saicret is lyin'
hard upon me; but I'll aise my mind, and let justice take it's coorse.
Bad I have been, but never so bad as to take my fellow-crature's life."

"Well, I'm glad to hear it," said his wife; "an' now I can undherstand
you."

"And I'm both glad and sorry," exclaimed Sarah; "sorry for the sake of
the Daltons. Oh! who would suppose it! and what will become of them?"

"I have no peace," her father added; "I have not had a minute's peace
ever since it happened; for sure, they say, any one that keeps their
knowledge of murdher saicret and won't tell it, is as bad as the
murdherer himself. There's another thing I have to mention," he added,
after a pause; "but I'll wait for a day or two; it's a thing I lost,
an', as the case stands now, I can do nothing widout it."

"What is it, father?" asked Sarah, with animation; "let us know what it
is."

"Time enough yet," he replied; "it'll do in a day or two; in the mean
time it's hard to tell but it may turn up somewhere or other; I hope it
may; for if it get into any hands but my own--"

He paused and bent his eyes with singular scrutiny first upon Sarah, who
had not the most distant appreciation of his meaning. Not so Nelly, who
felt convinced that the allusion he made was to the Tobacco-box, and her
impression being that it was mixed up in some way with an act of murder,
she determined to wait until he should explain himself at greater length
upon the subject. Had Sarah been aware of its importance, she would have
at once disclosed all she knew concerning it, together with Hanlon's
anxiety to get it into his possession. But of this she could know
nothing, and for that reason there existed no association, in her mind,
to connect it with the crime which the Prophet seemed resolved to bring
to light.

When Donnel Dhu laid himself down upon the bed that day, he felt that by
no effort could he shake a strong impression of evil from off him. The
disappearance of the Box surprised him so much, that he resolved
to stroll out and examine a spot with which the reader is already
acqu