m."

Again the prisoner seemed convulsed with that strange rage which the
officer did not understand. But the officers were tired, and they were
too familiar with the disapprobation of prisoners to be seriously
affected by it; so, after an appointment by the squire, and a final
glare of indignation from little Guzzy, they started, under the
constable's guidance, to the lock-up.

Suddenly the door was thrown open, and there appeared, with uncovered
head, streaming hair, weeping yet eager eyes, and mud-splashed garments,
Helen Wyett.

[Illustration: "WE MAY AS WELL FINISH THIS CASE TO-NIGHT, IF MISS WYETT
IS PREPARED TO TESTIFY," SAID THE JUDGE.]

Every one started, the officers stared, the squire looked a degree or
two less stupid, and hastened to button his dressing-gown; the restless
eyes of the convict fell on Helen's beautiful face, and were restless
no longer; while little Guzzy assumed a dignified pose, which did not
seem at all consistent with his confused and shamefaced countenance.

"We may as well finish this case to-night, if Miss Wyett is prepared to
testify," said the squire, at length. "Have you lost anything, Miss
Wyett?"

"No," said Helen; "but I have found my dearest treasure--my own
husband!"

And putting her arms around the convict's neck, she kissed him, and
then, dropping her head upon his shoulder, she sobbed violently.

The squire was startled into complete wakefulness, and as the moral
aspect of the scene presented itself to him, he groaned:

"Onequally yoked with an onbeliever."

The officers looked as if they were depraved yet remorseful convicts
themselves, while little Guzzy's diminutive dimensions seemed to
contract perceptibly.

At length the convict quieted his wife, and persuaded her to return to
her home, with a promise from the officers that she should see him in
the morning.

Then the officers escorted the prisoner to the jail, and Guzzy sneaked
quietly out, while the squire retired to his slumbers, with the firm
conviction that if Solomon had been a justice of the peace at Bowerton,
his denial of the newness of anything under the sun would never have
been made.

Now, the jail at Bowerton, like everything else in the town, was
decidedly antiquated, and consisted simply of a thickly-walled room in a
building which contained several offices and living apartments.

It was as extensive a jail as Bowerton needed, and was fully strong
enough to hold the few drunken and quar