I see nothing to admire in it."

Scarfe sneered.

"Jeffreys is fortunate in his champion. Perhaps, at least, Miss
Atherton, you will do me the credit of remembering that on one occasion
your hero owed his life to me. I hope that, too, was not cowardly or
cruel."

"If he had known the ruin you had in store for him, he would not have
thanked you."

Raby spoke with downcast eyes, and neither she nor Scarfe perceived the
poor tramp on the path, who, as they brushed past him, glanced wistfully
round at their faces.

"He never thanked me," said Scarfe.

They walked on some distance in silence. Then Scarfe said, "Miss
Atherton, you are unfair to me now. You think I acted out of spite,
instead of out of affection--for you."

"It is a kind of affection I don't appreciate, Mr Scarfe; and as the
rain has nearly stopped I need not trouble you any more. Thank you for
the shelter, and good-bye."

"You really mean that you reject me--that you do not care for me?"

"I do not. I am sorry to say so--good-bye."

And she left him there, bewildered certainly, but in no manner of doubt
that she had done with him.

She told her father all about it that evening, and was a good deal
reassured by his hearty approval of her conduct.

"The kindest thing you could have done, instead of letting him dangle
after you indefinitely. Rough on him, perhaps; but that sort of fellow
doesn't deserve much letting down."

The reader has heard already how in the course of her visits of mercy
Raby happened to find Jonah Trimble very near his end, and how she was
able to cheer and lighten his dying hours. Little dreamed she, as she
sat by the death-bed that morning, and wrote those few dying words, into
whose hands her little letter would fall, or what a spell they would
work on the life of him who received them. From the other neighbours
she heard not a little about "John," and sometimes wished she might
chance to see him. But he was away from early morning till late at
night, and they never met. Mrs Pratt in the room below, and her little
dying daughter, had many a tale of kindness and devotion to tell about
him; and when presently the little life fled, she heard with grateful
tears of his act of mercy to the poor overwrought mother, and thanked
God for it.

The time passed on, and one day early in December, when she returned
home, she found her father in an unwonted state of excitement.

"There's a clue, Raby, at last!" he said.