so very sinful?'

'It is not a question of smuggling, ma'am.'

'Oh, yes, it is!' she insisted. 'Once you get mixed up in that
business you have to deceive at times--if 'tis only to protect
others.'

'I can understand, ma'am,' said the doctor, after another pause,
'that to dabble in smuggling is to court many awkward situations.
You need not remind _me_ of that, who am fresh from misleading that
young man. It was--if you will pardon my saying so--by reason of his
trust in my good faith that you escaped cross-questioning.'

'I'll grant that, and with all my heart. But, since deceiving him
goes so hard against the grain with you, he shall know the truth
to-morrow, when he comes to apologise. Will that content you?'

'It will be some atonement, ma'am. As for contenting me--'

'You mean that I have given you a shock? And that to recover your
esteem will not be easy?'

She asked it with a small, pathetic sigh, and took a step towards the
fireplace, as if to entreat his pardon. But before he could be aware
of this his attention was claimed by a sound without. The latch of
the back door was lifted with a click, and, almost before he could
face about, steps were heard in the passage. The door of the best
kitchen opened a foot or so, and through the aperture was thrust the
head of Tryphena--of Tryphena, who by rights should be lying
upstairs, victim of a colic.

'Missus!' announced Tryphena, in a hoarse whisper. 'The kegs be
stowed all right in the orchet--all the four dozen. But here's
Butcher Truman, teasy as fire. Says he's been robbed o' fifty pounds
on the way an' can't pay the carriers! An' the carriers be tappin'
the stuff an' drinkin' what's left, an' neither to hold nor to bind
but threat'nin' to cut the inside of en out--an' he's here, if you
plaze, to know if so be you could lend a few pounds to satisfy 'em.
I told en--'

'Show him in,' commanded Mrs Tresize, with a creditable hold on her
voice; for, to tell the truth, she was half hysterical.

Tryphena withdrew, and pushed the strangest of figures through the
doorway. Butcher Truman had discarded the shawl from his head and
shoulders, or perchance it had been snatched away by the infuriated
carriers. For expedition, too, he had caught up his feminine skirt
and petticoat and twisted them and caught them about his waist with a
leathern belt, over which they hung in careless indecorous festoons,
draping a pair of corduroy breeches. But he sti