In he came, closed the door, and stood in the middle of the room, looking alternately at Mrs. Hare and Barbara.

"What is this cursed report, that's being whispered in the place!" quoth he, in a tone of suppressed rage, but not unmixed with awe.

"What report?" asked Mr. Carlyle, for the justice waited for an answer, and Mrs. Hare seemed unable to speak. Barbara took care to keep silence; she had some misgivings that the justice's words might be referring to herself--to the recent grievance.

"A report that he--he--has been here disguised as a laborer, has dared to show himself in the place where he'll come yet, to the gibbet."

Mrs. Hare's face turned as white as death; Mr. Carlyle rose and dexterously contrived to stand before her, so that it should not be seen. Barbara silently locked her hands, one within the other, and turned to the window.

"Of whom did you speak?" asked Mr. Carlyle, in a matter-of-fact tone, as if he were putting the most matter-of-fact question. He knew too well; but he thought to temporize for the sake of Mrs. Hare.

"Of whom do I speak!" uttered the exasperated justice, nearly beside himself with pa.s.sion; "of whom would I speak but the b.a.s.t.a.r.d d.i.c.k! Who else in West Lynne is likely to come to a felon's death?"

"Oh, Richard!" sobbed forth Mrs. Hare, as she sank back in her chair, "be merciful. He is our own true son."

"Never a true son of the Hares," raved the justice. "A true son of wickedness, and cowardice, and blight, and evil. If he has dared to show his face at West Lynne, I'll set the whole police of England upon his track, that he may be brought here as he ought, if he must come. When Locksley told me of it just now, I raised my hand to knock him down, so infamously false did I deem the report. Do you know anything of his having been here?" continued the justice to his wife, in a pointed, resolute tone.

How Mrs. Hare would have extricated herself, or what she would have answered, cannot even be imagined, but Mr. Carlyle interposed.

"You are frightening Mrs. Hare, sir. Don't you see that she knows nothing of it--that the very report of such a thing is alarming her into illness? But--allow me to inquire what it may be that Locksley said?"

"I met him at the gate," retorted Justice Hare, turning his attention upon Mr. Carlyle. "He was going by as I reached it. 'Oh, justice, I am glad I met you. That's a nasty report in the place that Richard has been here. I'd see what I could do toward hushing it up, sir, if I were you, for it may only serve to put the police in mind of by gone things, which it may be better they should forget.' Carlyle, I went, as I tell you, to knock him down. I asked him how he could have the hardihood to repeat such slander to my face. He was on the high horse directly; said the parish spoke the slander, not he; and I got out of him what it was he had heard."

"And what was it?" interrupted Mr. Carlyle, more eagerly than he generally spoke.

"Why, they say the fellow showed himself here some time ago, a year or so, disguised as a farm laborer--confounded fools! Not but what he'd have been the fool had he done it."

"To be sure he would," repeated Mr. Carlyle, "and he is not fool enough for that, sir. Let West Lynne talk, Mr. Hare; but do not put faith in a word of its gossip. I never do. Poor Richard, wherever he may be--"

"I won't have him pitied in my presence," burst forth the justice. "Poor Richard, indeed! Villain Richard, if you please."

"I was about to observe that, wherever he may be--whether in the backwoods of America, or digging for gold in California, or wandering about the United Kingdom--there is little fear that he will quit his place of safety to dare the dangerous ground of West Lynne. Had I been you, sir, I should have laughed at Locksley and his words."

"Why does West Lynne invent such lies?"

"Ah, there's the rub. I dare say West Lynne could not tell why, if it were paid for doing it; but it seems to have been a lame story it had got up this time. If they must have concocted a report that Richard had been seen at West Lynne, why put it back to a year ago--why not have fixed it for to-day or yesterday? If I heard anything more, I would treat it with the silence and contempt it deserves, justice."

Silence and contempt were not greatly in the justice's line; noise and explosion were more so. But he had a high opinion of the judgment of Mr.

Carlyle; and growling a sort of a.s.sent, he once more set forth to pay his evening visit.

"Oh, Archibald!" uttered Mrs. Hare, when her husband was half-way down the path, "what a mercy that you were here! I should inevitably have betrayed myself."

Barbara turned round from the window, "But what could have possessed Locksley to say what he did?" she exclaimed.

"I have no doubt Locksley spoke with a motive," said Mr. Carlyle. "He is not unfriendly to Richard, and thought, probably, that by telling Mr.

Hare of the report he might get it stopped. The rumor had been mentioned to me."

Barbara turned cold all over. "How can it have come to light?" she breathed.

"I am at a loss to know," said Mr. Carlyle. "The person to mention it to me was Tom Herbert. 'I say,' said he meeting me yesterday, 'what's this row about d.i.c.k Hare?' 'What now?' I asked him. 'Why, that d.i.c.k was at West Lynne some time back, disguised as a farm laborer.' Just the same, you see, that Locksley said to Mr. Hare. I laughed at Tom Herbert,"

continued Mr. Carlyle; "turned his report into ridicule also, before I had done with him."

"Will it be the means of causing Richard's detection?" murmured Mrs.

Hare from between her dry lips.

"No, no," warmly responded Mr. Carlyle. "Had the report arisen immediately after he was really here, it might not have been so pleasant; but nearly two years have elapsed since the period. Be under no uneasiness, dear Mrs. Hare, for rely upon it there is no cause."

"But how could it have come out, Archibald?" she urged, "and at this distant period of time?"

"I a.s.sure you I am quite at a loss to imagine. Had anybody at West Lynne seen and recognized Richard, they would have spoken of it at the time.

Do not let it trouble you; the rumor will die away."

Mrs. Hare sighed deeply, and left the room to proceed to her own chamber. Barbara and Mr. Carlyle were alone.

"Oh, that the real murderer could be discovered!" she aspirated, clasping her hands. "To be subjected to these shocks of fear is dreadful. Mamma will not be herself for days to come."

"I wish the right man could be found; but it seems as far off as ever,"

remarked Mr. Carlyle.

Barbara sat ruminating. It seemed that she would say something to Mr.

Carlyle, but a feeling caused her to hesitate. When she did at length speak, it was in a low, timid voice.

"You remember the description Richard gave, that last night, of the person he had met--the true Thorn?"

"Yes."

"Did it strike you then--has it ever occurred to you to think--that it accorded with some one?"

"In what way, Barbara?" he asked, after a pause. "It accorded with the description Richard always gave of the man Thorn."

"Richard spoke of the peculiar movement of throwing off the hair from the forehead--in this way. Did that strike you as being familiar, in connection with the white hand and the diamond ring?"

"Many have a habit of pushing off their hair--I think I do it myself sometimes. Barbara, what do you mean? Have you a suspicion of any one?"

"Have you?" she returned, answering the question by asking another.

"I have not. Since Captain Thorn was disposed of, my suspicions have not pointed anywhere."

This sealed Barbara's lips. She had hers, vague doubts, bringing wonder more than anything else. At times she had thought the same doubts might have occurred to Mr. Carlyle; she now found that they had not. The terrible domestic calamity which had happened to Mr. Carlyle the same night that Richard protested he had seen Thorn, had prevented Barbara's discussing the matter with him then, and she had never done so since.

Richard had never been further heard of, and the affair had remained in abeyance.

"I begin to despair of its ever being discovered," she observed. "What will become of poor Richard?"

"We can but wait, and hope that time may bring forth its own elucidation," continued Mr. Carlyle.

"Ah," sighed Barbara, "but it is weary waiting--weary, weary."

"How is it you contrive to get under the paternal displeasure?" he resumed, in a gayer tone.