;--this morning? If you insist upon that, the
answer can only be of one sort. If I am driven to decide this morning
on the question that you have asked me, great as the honour is--and
coming from you, Mr. Staveley, it is very great--I must decline it. I
am not able, at any rate at the present moment, to trust my happiness
altogether in your hands." When we think of the half-written letter
which at this moment Miss Furnival had within her desk, this was not
wonderful.

And then, without having said anything more that was of note,
Augustus Staveley went his way. As he walked up Harley Street, he
hardly knew whether or no he was to consider himself as bound to Miss
Furnival; nor did he feel quite sure whether or no he wished to be so
bound. She was handsome, and clever, and an heiress; but yet he was
not certain that she possessed all those womanly charms which are
desirable in a wife. He could not but reflect that she had never yet
said a soft word to him.

CHAPTER LXVII

MR. MOULDER BACKS HIS OPINION

As the day of the trial drew nigh, the perturbation of poor John
Kenneby's mind became very great. Moulder had not intended to
frighten him, but had thought it well to put him up to what he
believed to be the truth. No doubt he would be badgered and bullied.
"And," as Moulder said to his wife afterwards, "wasn't it better that
he should know what was in store for him?" The consequence was, that
had it been by any means possible, Kenneby would have run away on the
day before the trial.

But it was by no means possible, for Dockwrath had hardly left him
alone for an instant. Dockwrath at this time had crept into a sort of
employment in the case from which Matthew Round had striven in vain
to exclude him. Mr. Round had declared once or twice that if Mr.
Mason encouraged Dockwrath in interfering, he, Round, would throw
the matter up. But professional men cannot very well throw up their
business, and Round went on, although Dockwrath did interfere, and
although Mr. Mason did encourage him. On the eve of the trial he went
down to Alston with Kenneby and Bolster; and Mr. Moulder, at the
express instance of Kenneby, accompanied them.

"What can I do? I can't stop the fellow's gab," Moulder had said. But
Kenneby pleaded hard that some friend might be near him in the day of
his trouble, and Moulder at last consented.

"I wish it was me," Mrs. Smiley had said, when they talked the matter
over in Great St. Helens; "I'