go through all that again."

"Yes, Tom, but we could do it. I know of a gentleman who made a hundred
of these specula with his own hands. But there will be something more
interesting for you to see to-morrow."

"What, shall we get it done?"

"By no means; but first thing of all I must test it, and to do this
easily, we must be up early when the sun is shining in at the east
window of our workshop. Do you think you can call me by five?"

"I'm sure of it, uncle," cried Tom.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN.

Tom kept his word, for he started into wakefulness in the grey dawn out
of an uncomfortable dream, in which he had seen the unfinished speculum
fall off the bench on to the stone-floor, roll like a wheel out of the
door, down the slope to the gate, bound over, and then go spinning down
the lane and across the green, straight for the ragstone churchyard
wall, where it was shivered to pieces.

"Only a dream," he said, as he leaped out of bed, ran to the window, and
saw by the church clock that it was only half-past four.

"Time to go over and see if it is all right," he said, as he finished
dressing, "and then come back and call uncle."

Going down-stairs, he took the keys of the mill from where they hung by
the front door, went out into the garden, unlocked the gate, and went
across to the mill, where, on peering through the window, he could see
the glass lying just as it had been left.

"That's all right," said Tom; and he walked round by the back of the
tower to see how the flowers and shrubs looked, when, to his startled
surprise, he found footprints made by a heavy, clumsy pair of boots on
the border beneath the wall.

Their meaning was plain enough. Some one had walked along there, and
got out of the yard over the wall, while, upon a little further search,
he found the spot where whoever it was had entered the yard by jumping
down, the prints of two heels being deeply-marked in the newly-dug
earth.

"That must have been Pete," said Tom, flushing; and he looked over the
wall, half expecting to see the slouching figure of the lad.

But there was no one within sight, and he looked round the yard in
search of the visitor's object. There was nothing but the old
millstones stealable, and they stood here and there where they had been
leaned against tower and wall; and at ten minutes to five, after noting
that the sun was shining brightly, Sam went back to his uncle and called
him, and at half-past five they wen