e himself knew. He related the midnight visit
which I had paid him, explained my former situation in the family, and
my disappearance in September. He stated the advice he had given me to
carry Eliza to her uncle's, and my promise to comply with his counsel.
The uncle declared he had seen nothing of his niece, and Caleb added,
that, when she set out, she took the road that led to town.

These hints afforded grounds for much conjecture and suspicion. Ellis
now mentioned some intelligence that he had gathered respecting me in a
late journey to ----. It seems I was the son of an honest farmer in that
quarter, who married a tidy girl of a milkmaid that lived with him. My
father had detected me in making some atrocious advances to my
mother-in-law, and had turned me out of doors. I did not go off,
however, without rifling his drawer of some hundreds of dollars, which
he had laid up against a rainy day. I was noted for such pranks, and was
hated by all the neighbours for my pride and laziness. It was easy, by
comparison of circumstances, for Ellis to ascertain that Hadwin's
servant Mervyn was the same against whom such heavy charges were laid.

Previously to this journey, he had heard of me from Hadwin, who was loud
in praise of my diligence, sobriety, and modesty. For his part, he had
always been cautious of giving countenance to vagrants that came from
nobody knew where, and worked their way with a plausible tongue. He was
not surprised to hear it whispered that Betsy Hadwin had fallen in love
with the youth, and now, no doubt, he had persuaded her to run away with
him. The heiress of a fine farm was a prize not to be met with every
day.

Philip broke into rage at this news; swore that if it turned out so, his
niece should starve upon the town, and that he would take good care to
balk the lad. His brother he well knew had left a will, to which he was
executor, and that this will would in good time be forthcoming. After
much talk and ransacking the house, and swearing at his truant niece, he
and his company departed, charging Caleb to keep the house and its
contents for his use. This was all that Caleb's memory had retained of
that day's proceedings.

Curling had lately commented on the character of Philip Hadwin. This man
was totally unlike his brother, was a noted brawler and bully, a tyrant
to his children, a plague to his neighbours, and kept a rendezvous for
drunkards and idlers, at the sign of the Bull's Head, at --