ld not receive him, "that he would be unwise not to see
me, and the same to Mistress Wilding."

And old Jasper had carried his message, and had told Richard of the
wicked smile that had been on Sir Rowland's lips when he had uttered it.

Now Richard was in many ways a changed man since that night at Weston
Zoyland. A transformation seemed to have been wrought in him as odd as
it was sudden, and it dated from the moment when with tears in his
eyes he had wrung Wilding's hand in farewell. Where precept had failed,
Richard found himself converted by example. He contrasted himself in
that stressful hour with great-souled Anthony Wilding, and saw himself
as he was, a weakling, strong only in vicious ways. Repentance claimed
him; repentance and a fine ambition to be worthier, to resemble as
nearly as his nature would allow him this Anthony Wilding whom he took
for pattern. He changed his ways, abandoned drink and gaming, and gained
thereby a healthier countenance. Then in his zeal he overshot his mark.
He developed a taste for Scripture-reading, bethought him of prayers,
and even took to saying grace to his meat. Indeed--for conversion,
when it comes, is a furious thing--the swing of his soul's pendulum
threatened now to carry him to extremes of virtue and piety. "O Lord!"
he would cry a score of times a day, "Thou hast brought up my soul from
the grave; Thou hast kept me alive that I should not go down to the
pit!"

But underlying all this remained unfortunately the inherent weakness of
his nature--indeed, it was that very weakness and malleability made this
sudden and wholesale conversion possible.

Upon hearing Sir Rowland's message his heart fainted, despite his good
intentions, and he urged that perhaps they had better hear what the
baronet might have to say.

It was three days after Sedgemoor Fight, and poor Ruth was worn and
exhausted with her grief--believing Wilding dead, for he had sent no
message to inform her of his almost miraculous preservation. The thing
he went to do in London was fraught with such peril that he foresaw
but the slenderest chance of escaping with his life. Therefore, he had
argued, why console her now with news that he lived, when in a few days
the headsman might prove that his end had been but postponed? To do so
might be to give her cause to mourn him twice. Again he was haunted by
the thought that, in spite of all, it may have been pity that had so
grievously moved her at their last mee