oebuck, which was the best bed in the house. At this moment
the door opened, and Mr. Swain came in hurriedly.

"I pray you, gentlemen," he cried, "and he is fit to be moved, you will
let me take him to Marlboro' Street. I have a chariot at the door."

CHAPTER XV

OF WHICH THE RECTOR HAS THE WORST

'Twas late when I awoke the next day with something of a dull ache in my
neck, and a prodigious stiffness, studying the pleatings of the bed
canopy over my head. And I know not how long I lay idly thus when I
perceived Mrs. Willis moving quietly about, and my grandfather sitting
in the armchair by the window, looking into Freshwater Lane. As my eyes
fell upon him my memory came surging back,--first of the duel, then of
its cause. And finally, like a leaden weight, the thought of the
deception I had practised upon him, of which he must have learned
ere this. Nay, I was sure from the troubled look of his face that
he knew of it.

"Mr. Carvel," I said.

At the sound of my voice he got hastily from his chair and hurried to my
side.

"Richard," he answered, taking my hand, "Richard!"

I opened my mouth to speak, to confess. But he prevented me, the tears
filling the wrinkles around his eyes.

"Nay, lad, nay. We will not talk of it. I know all."

"Mr. Allen has been here--" I began.

"And be d--d to him! Be d--d to him for a wolf in sheep's clothing!"
shouted my grandfather, his manner shifting so suddenly to anger that I
was taken back. "So help me God I will never set foot in St. Anne's
while he is rector. Nor shall he come to this house!"

And he took three or four disorderly turns about the room.

"Ah!" he continued more quietly, with something of a sigh, "I might have
known how stubborn your mind should be. That you was never one to blow
from the north one day and from the south the next. I deny not that
there be good men and able of your way of thinking: Colonel Washington,
for one, whom I admire and honour; and our friend Captain Daniel. They
have been here to-day, Richard, and I promise you were good advocates."

Then I knew that I was forgiven. And I could have thrown myself at Mr.
Carvel's feet for happiness.

"Has Colonel Washington spoken in my favour, sir?"

"That he has. He is upon some urgent business for the North, I believe,
which he delayed for your sake. Both he and the captain were in my
dressing-room before I was up, ahead of that scurrilous clergyman, who
was for pushing his way to my