great respect, and would have
been almost as unwilling as the Doctor himself to tell stories to the
schoolmaster's discredit. "They are saying down at the Lamb"--the Lamb
was the Bowick public-house--"that Lefroy told them all yesterday----" the
Doctor hesitated before he could tell it.

"That my wife is not my wife?"

"Just so."

"Of course I am prepared for it. I knew that it would be so; did not
you?"

"I expected it."

"I was sure of it. It may be taken for granted at once that there is no
longer a secret to keep. I would wish you to act just as though all the
facts were known to the entire diocese." After this there was a pause,
during which neither of them spoke for a few moments. The Doctor had not
intended to declare any purpose of his own on that occasion, but it seemed
to him now as though he were almost driven to do so. Then Mr. Peacocke
seeing the difficulty at once relieved him from it. "I am quite prepared
to leave Bowick," he said, "at once. I know that it must be so. I have
thought about it, and have perceived that there is no possible
alternative. I should like to consult with you as to whither I had better
go. Where shall I first take her?"

"Leave her here," said the Doctor.

"Here! Where?"

"Where she is in the school-house. No one will come to fill your place
for a while."

"I should have thought," said Mr. Peacocke very slowly, "that her
presence--would have been worse almost,--than my own."

"To me,"--said the Doctor,--"to me she is as pure as the most unsullied
matron in the country." Upon this Mr. Peacocke, jumping from his chair,
seized the Doctor's hand, but could not speak for his tears; then he
seated himself again, turning his face away towards the wall. "To no one
could the presence of either of you be an evil. The evil is, if I may say
so, that the two of you should be here together. You should be
apart,--till some better day has come upon you."

"What better day can ever come?" said the poor man through his tears.

Then the Doctor declared his scheme. He told what he thought as to
Ferdinand Lefroy, and his reason for believing that the man was dead. "I
felt sure from his manner that his brother is now dead in truth. Go to
him and ask him boldly," he said.

"But his word would not suffice for another marriage ceremony."

To this the Doctor agreed. It was not his intention, he said, that they
should proceed on evidence as slight as that. No; a step