ct: Gurdon, the old butler, must have stolen it. Sir
Murray had accused him of it; and if proper search had been made, no
doubt it would have been found. Twenty years transportation he was to
suffer, and that period must be up now some time; was it possible that,
upon a promise being given him that no further prosecution should
follow, and a bribe were supplied, he would afford such information as
should prove to the satisfaction of all what had become of the cross?

No doubt he would--_if alive_!

Brace determined to try and trace Gurdon--to see if he had returned to
this country; and, leaving home, he sought out the proper official place
at which to apply, and learned that John Gurdon had completed his term
of servitude, and had then been set at liberty. That was all. He had
been set at liberty twelve thousand miles from England; nothing further
was known.

"I shall meet him, perhaps, during my cruises," muttered Brace,
bitterly; and he returned home utterly disheartened.

Then he turned his attention to the disappearance of Lady Gernon. What
had become of her? Elopement was out of the question. Had she, moved
thereto by Sir Murray's harsh treatment and cruel suspicions, fled, to
pass the rest of her life somewhere at peace? If so, without doubt, in
the course of twenty years, she must have been heard of. That
supposition was not likely, and he dismissed it, to give place to a
dread fear that, sick of life, she might have sought rest in direct
opposition to the divine canon. But Brace could not harbour that
thought. Lady Gernon had always been painted to him as too pure-minded,
patient, and suffering a woman to fly to such a refuge; she was rather
one to suffer and pray for strength to bear it.

"Of what are you thinking, Brace?" said Mrs Norton, tenderly, as,
entering his room, she found him brooding over a new suspicion that had
entered his mind.

He started as she spoke to him, and tried to drive away his thoughts,
and to speak to her cheerfully; but the same dire suspicion came again
and again, and at last, as she urged him to speak--to confide in her--he
said, almost in a whisper:

"Mother, I was wondering if it were possible that Lady Gernon was
murdered!"

Mrs Norton shuddered as she recalled the visit of Jane McCray, and the
disclosures she had made--every word of which, in spite of the great
lapse of time, now seemed to occur to her as plainly as if they had been
spoken but a few hours si