"Who has thrown you over?" said Mrs Glaire, contemptuously.

"You needn't believe me without you like," said Richard; "but I am speaking the truth now. Sim Slee was to take her across to Lupsthorpe station, and go with her to town."

"Yes."

"And stay with her till I came, after the heat of the row was over; for no one would have missed him."

"Well?" said Mrs Glaire, contemptuously.

"Well, he has thrown me over," said Richard. "I met him this morning, and found he had not been."

"What did he say?" said Mrs Glaire.

"Swore he couldn't find her."

"Then the wolf set the fox to carry off the lamb, and now the fox says he has not seen the prey," said Mrs Glaire, smiling.

"d.a.m.n your riddles and fables!" cried Richard, who was beside himself with rage. "I tell you he has sold me."

"What you might have expected," said his mother.

"The scoundrel has hidden her somewhere," cried Richard; "and it's his plan to get more money out of me."

"What you might have expected," said Mrs Glaire, again. "You had better set the police to watch him and find him out."

"Not while I can do it better myself," said the young man, with a cunning grin upon his countenance. "You have both been very clever, I dare say you think; and if the truth were known, you have been setting Sim Slee to get her away, so as to marry me to your pet; but you won't succeed."

"You are wrong, Richard; I would not trust Sim Slee with the value of a penny. I gave him ten pounds for his information, and I have not seen him since. You had better employ the police."

"Curse the police!" cried Richard, looking hard at his mother's face, and feeling that she was telling him the truth; "what good are they? I might have been killed before they would have interfered. But I've not done with Master Sim Slee yet."

"Then you will not employ the police?"

"No," said Richard, sharply; "the matter's tangled enough as it is; but he's got the wrong man to deal with, has Sim Slee, if he thinks he has cheated me so easily."

"Better leave him alone," said Mrs Glaire, wearily. "You have enough to attend to with your own affairs."

"This is my affair," cried Richard.

"Bombast and sound," said his mother. "I suppose you and Slee are in collusion, and this is done to blind me, and the rest of the town. But there, you must follow your own course."

"I mean to," said Richard; and the breach between him and his mother seemed to be getting wider than ever.

Volume 2, Chapter XI.

A FRIENDLY MEETING.

There was a goodly meeting at the Bull and Cuc.u.mber that evening, for the discussion of the disappearance of Daisy Banks. Sim Slee was there, and one of the chief spokesmen.

"Well, what do you say, Sim?" said the landlord, with a wink at his other guests, as much as to say, "Let's draw him out."

"Say!" cried Sim; "why, that d.i.c.k Glaire's a lungeing villin. Look at him: a man fixed in business as he is, and plenty o' money, and he knows nowt but nastiness. He ought to be hung."

"Where weer you to-day, Sim?" said another. "I didn't see thee helping."

"Helping!" said Sim; "why, I was in the thicket all day. Search indeed!

what's the good o' searching for what aint theer?"

"Do you know wheer she is?" said the landlord.

"If yow want to know wheer Daisy Banks is, ask d.i.c.ky Glaire, and--"

"And what?" said several, for Sim had stopped short.

"And he wean't tell yow," said Sim. "He knows, though. Why, he's been mad after the la.s.s for months; and if she weer my bairn, I'd half kill him; that's what I'd do wi' him. He's a bad lot, and it's a pity as Dumford can't get shoot of him. Such rubbish! he's ony fit to boon the roads."

"Well, Sim," said the grocer, "when they make you boon master, you can use him up o' purpose."

"h.e.l.lo!" said Sim, "what! are yow here? I thowt as the Bull and Cowc.u.mber wasn't good enew for such as thee."

"You niver thowt so, Sim," said the jovial little grocer, laughing, "till I wouldn't give thee any more credit till thou had paid what thee owdst."

"I can pay yow any day," said Sim, c.h.i.n.king the money in his pocket.

"Yes, but yow wean't," said the grocer, imitating Sim's broad Lincoln dialect. "Yes, I wanted to hear a bit o' the news," he continued, "so I thowt I'd put up the shuts and have a gill and a pipe, same as another man; for I niver object to my 'lowance, as is good for any man as works hard."

"So 'tis, so 'tis," chorussed several.

"How chuff we are to-night," said Sim, with a sneer; "why, yow're getting quite sharp. Yow wearn't so nation fast wi' your tongue fore yow took to trade and was only a bricklayer. It's all very fine for a man to marry a grocer's widow, and take to her trade and money, and then come and teach others, and bounce about his money."

"Oh, I'm not ashamed of having handled the mortar-trowel before I took to the sugar-scoop," said the grocer, laughing.

"When it used to be to the boy," continued Sim, mimicking the other's very slow drawling speech: "'Joey, wilt thou bring me another brick?'

and then thou used to groan because it weer so heavy."

"Sim Slee's in full swing to-night," said another guest.

"He will be if he don't look out, for Tom Podmore says he's sure he had a hand in getting away Daisy Banks," said another; "and Joe Banks is sure of it. I wouldn't be surprised if he hung him."

"Don't you be so nation fast," said Sim, changing colour a little, but laughing it off the next moment. "Iv I were a owry chap like thee, Sam'l Benson, I'd wesh mesen afore I took to talking about other folk.

It was Sam'l, you know," continued Sim, to the others, "that owd parson spoke to when he weer a boy. 'When did thee wesh thee hands last, Sam?'

he says, pointing at 'em wi' his stick. 'When we'd done picking tates,'

says Sam, He, he, he! and that was three months before, and parson give 'im a penny to ware in soap."

There was a hearty laugh at this, in which the man of whom the story was told joined.

"Strange different sort o' man this one to the last parson," said the grocer.