aw here. Why should she wish to see
one who has only injured her?"

"I ain't injured her;--at any rate not as yet. I ain't done nothing;--not
as yet. I've been as dark as the grave;--as yet. Let her come down, and
you go away for a moment, and let us see if we can't settle it."

"There is nothing for you to settle. Nothing that you can do, nothing
that you can say, will influence either her or me. If you have anything
to tell, go and tell it."

"Why should you smash up everything in that way, Peacocke? You're
comfortable here; why not remain so? I don't want to hurt you. I want to
help you;--and I can. Three hundred dollars wouldn't be much to you. You
were always a fellow as had a little money by you."

"If this box were full of gold," said the schoolmaster, laying his hand
upon a black desk which stood on the table, "I would not give you one cent
to induce you to hold your tongue for ever. I would not condescend even
to ask it of you as a favour. You think that you can disturb our
happiness by telling what you know of us to Dr. Wortle. Go and try."

Mr. Peacocke's manner was so firm that the other man began to doubt
whether in truth he had a secret to tell. Could it be possible that Dr.
Wortle knew it all, and that the neighbours knew it all, and that, in
spite of what had happened, the position of the man and of the woman was
accepted among them? They certainly were not man and wife, and yet they
were living together as such. Could such a one as this Dr. Wortle know
that it was so? He, when he had spoken of the purposes for which the boys
were sent there, asking whether they were not sent for education, for
morals and religion, had understood much of the Doctor's position. He had
known the peculiar value of his secret. He had been aware that a
schoolmaster with a wife to whom he was not in truth married must be out
of place in an English seminary such as this. But yet he now began to
doubt. "I am to be turned out, then?" he asked.

"Yes, indeed, Colonel Lefroy. The sooner you go the better."

"That's a pretty sort of welcome to your wife's brother-in-law, who has
just come over all the way from Mexico to see her."

"To get what he can out of her by his unwelcome presence," said Peacocke.
"Here you can get nothing. Go and do your worst. If you remain much
longer I shall send for the policeman to remove you."

"You will?"

"Yes, I shall. My time is not my own, and I cannot go over to