The mail-cart robbery

An incident savouring strongly of romance occurred many years ago in one of the midland counties of England. It is a true story.

There stood one morning in the post-office of the chief town of Highamshire (as we will call it) two gentlemen sorting letters. The London mail had just come in, bringing its multiplicity of business. They were the postmaster of Higham and his son. The former, most deservedly respected by his fellow-citizens, and well-connected, had held the situation for many years; the latter, a handsome young man, looked forward to holding the situation after him.

"Ready," cried out Mr. Grame, in a loud tone; and the side-door opened, and four men entered, and ranged themselves in front of the counter. They were the town post-men, and each, receiving his separate freight, departed for his allotted quarter of the city. It was striking half-past nine as they left the post-office: an hour considered to be good time in those days.

Mr. Grame and his son continued their work: that of making-up the bags for the cross-country towns and villages. Upon one letter, as it came under his observation, Mr. Grame's eye rested rather longer than on the rest.

"Here's Farmer Sterling's letter at last, Walter," he observed to his son.

"Has it come?" cried the young man, in a lively tone, while he suspended for a moment his own employment, and leaned towards his father, to look at the address of the letter in question. "'Mr. Sterling, Hill House Farm, Layton, Highamshire.' Ah! he need not have been so fidgety over it; I told him it would be all right."

"He has never been otherwise than fidgety over this yearly letter."

"Because of the money it contains," rejoined Walter.

At that moment somebody's knuckles came rapping at the glazed window; and Mr. Grame, who stood next it, pushed back the wooden slide from an open pane and looked out. But, first of all, he dropped the letter for Farmer Sterling safely into the Layton bag.

"Is that there letter come yet, sir?" inquired the voice at the window.

"Oh, is it you, Stone! I don't think it is. What was to be the address?"

"Miss Parker, Post-office, till called for."

"Ay. No, it has not arrived. Better luck to-morrow, perhaps."

"It's my belief it won't come at all. The young woman, you know, replied to the advertisement for a housekeeper, which was in the Higham Herald last Saturday week. I tell'd her yesterday that perhaps she'd have no answer. Did you hear of Ned Cook's shop being broke into last night, sir?"

"No," shortly answered the postmaster. "I am busy now, and can't talk."

And the board slided sharply back again, nearly shutting up the end of Mr. Stone's nose with it. "Good-day, gentlemen," said that discomfited applicant, as he moved away.

A little more work in the post-office, and then Mr. Grame called out as before, "Weirford and Layton bags ready!" And a tall, fine young man, with an open countenance, looking much more like a gentleman than like the driver of a village mail-cart, came in.

"Not a heavy freight this morning, John," observed Mr. Grame, as he handed over the bags, secured only with string, the careless practice of the Higham post-office in those days, and of other post-offices, also. "Have you had your horse rough-shod?"

"All right and ready," responded John Ledbitter, with a pleasant smile.

"Or I don't know how you would get to Layton; the roads must be dreadful. Take care that you start back in good time, or you may be too late for the evening mail."

"I'll take care," answered the young man. "As to the roads, if anybody can drive over them I can, let them be what they will. Any commands"--dropping his voice as he spoke to the son--"for the farm, Mr. Walter?"

"Are you going there this morning?"

"If I don't change my mind. Can I carry any message, I say?"

"No," sharply replied Mr. Walter Grame, and John Ledbitter laughed to himself as he went out with the bags.

Locking them into the box of his cart, an open vehicle, and taking his seat, he drove out of the town towards Layton, as fast as the dangerous roads would allow. It was the month of January, and Jack Frost had come down with all his severity: snow on the fields, icicles on the trees, frozen snow and ice lying in wait to break limbs on the road. But John Ledbitter's horse had been prepared for the state of affairs, and he drove him cautiously.

"It's too bad of me, but I do like to nettle him," he said to himself, as he laid the reins on the dash-board, and began to beat his arms, to bring a little feeling into them. "'Are you going there?' cries he so sharply, when I mischievously asked him if he had any commands for the farm. Many a day does not pass over my head but I do go there, Master Walter, and that you'll find out, soon. Now, Saucy Sir! hold up!"

"The idea of his making up to her," continued Mr. John Ledbitter, tightening the reins. "She's a mile and a half too good for him. Why is it I never liked the fellow? She has nothing to do with the dislike: he always repelled me; years before I thought of her. He is a handsome man, an agreeable companion, has plenty of intellect--yes, all that. But, there's a turn in his expression that I don't like--something crafty, not genuine; other people may not see it, but I know it repels me. And look at the fellow's vanity where women are concerned! He thinks that he has only to ask Selina and have her. Not so fast, Mr. Walter Grame: Selina cares more for my little finger than she does for your whole self--as the old song goes:

'Despise her not, said Lord Thomas,
Despise her not unto me,
For I love thy little finger
Better than her whole body.'

Gently, Saucy Sir! keep your feet, if you please, to-day, of all days in the year."

Finding his whole attention must be directed to the care of his horse, John Ledbitter put off his reflections to a more convenient season. At length he reached Layton, a small town about seven miles from Higham, having left the other bag at Weirford on his way. He drove straight to the post-office, unlocked his cart, and delivered the Layton bag to the postmaster, Mr. Marsh.

"A sharp day," remarked the latter.

"Sharp enough," replied John. "I have had some trouble with the horse, I can tell you."

"It's a wonder he kept his feet at all. Sir Geoffry Adams's bailiff was coming down yonder hill last night on the bay mare, and down she went, and broke her leg. Had to be shot."

"No!"

"I stepped up, and saw her lying there in the road, Mr. Ledbitter: her groans, poor thing, were just like a human creature's. Sir Geoffry was called out from his dinner, and shot her with his own hand. He was awful with Master Bailiff over it, and told him if he had been humane enough to lead her down the hill, it would not have happened. He was cut up too, and didn't offer a word of excuse to Sir Geoffry. Good-day, if you are off to put up Saucy Sir."

The mail-cart and Saucy Sir being comfortably deposited at their usual quarters, John Ledbitter took a sharp walk of twenty minutes, which brought him to Hill House Farm; taking off his great coat and leggings before he entered the sitting-room, he appeared in morning attire usually worn in those days by gentlemen.

"Here's a morning!" he said, as a fair, quiet-looking girl rose at his entrance, the farmer's only child. Many would have called Miss Sterling's features plain, but in her gentle voice and truthful earnest eyes lay plenty of attraction.

"What a journey you must have had!" she exclaimed, giving him her hand.

"Ay, indeed. I thought once it would have come to my carrying Saucy Sir. Where's Selina?"

Before Miss Sterling could reply, her father entered.

"Ah, Master Ledbitter, is it you?" he said. "Well, d'ye think you have brought that letter of mine to-day?"

"I don't know," laughed the young man. "I have brought the bag. I cannot say what letters are in it."

"Well, I can't account for the delay. If that letter's lost, there's fifty pounds gone. And fifty pounds are not picked up in a day, Master Ledbitter."

Some few years before this, the sister of Mrs. Sterling, who had married a Mr. Cleeve and settled in London, died, leaving one only daughter. Mr. Cleeve married again, and then the child was consigned to the home and care of Mrs. Sterling, Mr. Cleeve forwarding every Christmas a fifty-pound note, to cover her expenses. It was this note that Farmer Sterling was so anxious to receive; and each year, from the moment Christmas-Day was turned until the money was actually in hand, he never ceased worrying himself and everybody about him, with conjectures that the note was lost. It had been pointed out to him several times, that to have the money conveyed in a letter was not a very safe mode of transit. But the farmer would answer that it had always come safely hitherto (though with delay), and he had no time, not he, to go driving into Higham to receive it from the bankers there. So that Mr. Sterling continued to expect and receive this important letter and its enclosure every year; a well-known fact to all Layton, and to half Higham. This was the letter noticed by the postmaster that morning, as he sorted it into the Layton bag.

Selina Cleeve, now grown up, and about the age of her cousin, was a tall, well-educated, handsome, dark-eyed girl, full of fun and laughter; she played and sang like the nightingales in Layton Wood (as people were wont to express it), rode her horse with ease and grace, and took everybody's heart by storm. All the bachelor farmers were quarrelling for her; and many a fine gentleman from Higham wore out his horse's shoes riding over to Hill House Farm. They might have spared themselves the trouble; the farmers their quarrelling, and the gentlemen their steeds, for the young lady's heart was given to John Ledbitter; but, woman-like, she kept this to herself, and evinced no objection to the universal admiration. As to Anne Sterling, no fine gentleman noticed her; her attractive cousin was all in all. The housekeeping and other household management devolved on Anne; who had been as well-educated as her cousin, except in the matter of some accomplishments. Mrs. Sterling was an invalid, and some-times did not leave her room for days together.

"Shall you be able to come to-night?" said Anne Sterling to Mr. Ledbitter, as her father left the parlour.

"With this weather, Anne?" he returned, half jestingly.

"But the moon will be up. Do try."

"You unreasonable girl! the moon will not dissolve the ice on the roads. What is it you are doing there, so industriously?"

"Cutting papers for the candlesticks," rejoined Anne. "This is the last. And now I must hasten into the kitchen. I have a thousand-and-one things to do to-day, and the maids' heads seem turned."

"Can I help you?"

"No," laughed Anne, "you would be a hindrance, I suspect, instead of a help. Selina will be here directly."

She entered the parlour as Anne Sterling left it. A stylish girl, in a rich plaid silk dress, her black hair worn in heavy braids round her head. Selina's private allowance from her father was liberal, and she dressed in accordance with it. Upon her entrance, John Ledbitter's manner changed to one of deep tenderness. He closed the door, and drew her fondly to him.

"Oh, John!" were her first words, "what unfortunate weather for our party to-night! You will never be able to come."

"My darling! Had I to walk every step of the way, here and back, and could remain but time to snatch one word with you, I should not fail to come."

"But you will have both to come and return in the night! Others can choose the daylight."

"The first dance, remember, Selina, after I do get here. Who comes from Higham? Walter Grame, of course."

"Of course. And his sisters come, and several others: all the young lawyers and doctors in the town, I think. Walter Grame has engaged me for the first and last dances: you will not be here at either. And as many more as I would accord him between, he said."

John Ledbitter laughed a meaning laugh, and his eye twinkled mischievously. " Selina," he whispered, "I fear his case is desperate. What say you?"

She understood him. And though she did not say it in words, he read the answer in her bent, happy countenance.

Delaying his departure as long as was prudent, and still talking with Miss Cleeve, John Ledbitter at length rose to go. In the kitchen, where he went to don his overalls and rough coat, he met Molly, carrying out a tray of mince pies and small tartlets. Molly had lived in the family for twenty years; and tyrannized in consequence over the other servant, Joan, who had been in it only ten.

"Don't they look first-rate!" cried Molly to the young man, who was coolly helping himself. "But they be nothing, Mr. John; just please step in here." Opening the door of a large room, she proudly disclosed to view the long supper-table, already laid out with its tempting dainties, and decorated with holly and laurels. A magnificent twelfth-day cake stood in the middle, for it was Twelfth Day. A bright fire of wood and coal blazed away in the grate.

"Grand! Glorious!" exclaimed John. "Why you must have had half the pastrycooks in the parish here to prepare all those sweets and jellies!"

"Pastrycooks! What next?" cried the offended Molly. "Miss Anne and me did 'em all ourselves. You won't find Miss Anne's match in this county, Mr. Ledbitter; nor in any other. My mistress has brought her up right well. She don't play the pianer, it's true; and she don't spend hours over her hair, a-setting of it off in outlandish winds about her head; and she don't dress in silks the first thing in a morning," satirically added Molly, with an allusion to somebody else, which Mr. John perfectly well understood, and laughed at. "But see Miss Anne in illness: who tends a sick body's bed like she?--hear her pleasant voice a-soothing any poor soul what's in trouble--look how she manages this house, and gives counsel to master about the farm outdoors! No, Mr. John: you young gentlemen like to please your eye, but give me one who has got qualities inside of 'em that will shine out when hair's grey and pianers is rusty."

John Ledbitter turned away laughing. He ran against the farmer in the kitchen.

"Are you coming to their fine doings to-night, Mr. Ledbitter?"

"If I can get here."

"Bless the foolish women, I say, putting things about, like this, for a night's pleasure! I don't know our house upstairs, Mr. John; I don't, I assure you. They have made the big best bedroom into the dancing-room, and covered the walls with green leaves and sconces for candles, and chalked the floor. I won't be candle-snuffer."

"There won't be no snuffing wanted, master," interposed Molly, tartly. "The candles is wax."

"Wax! I said I'd have no wax candles in the house again," retorted the farmer. "The last time we had one of these affairs, 1 got my best blue coat covered with its droppings."

"Never you mind the droppings, master," cried Molly; "the room will look beautiful."

"It had need to," rejoined the farmer. "I shall stop in the kitchen and smoke my pipe. Good-day, Mr. John, if you are going."

Mr. John had to go, though no doubt his will would have inclined him to stay. In half-an-hour's time he was driving Saucy Sir back to Higham with the Layton and Weirford letter-bags for the evening mail, which was made up at Higham in the afternoon.

A merry scene that evening at the Hill House Farm! It was the custom in the neighbourhood for the more wealthy farmers to hold annually one of these entertainments, which were distinguished by great profusion of dainties, a hearty welcome, and thorough enjoyment. Dancing was kept up till daylight, then came breakfast, and then the guests dispersed. At Mr. Sterling's the party had been omitted for the last two years, in consequence of Mrs. Sterling's precarious state of health; now, as she was somewhat better, it was renewed again. Mr. Sterling was highly regarded by all. In spite of his rustic mode of speech, he was a superior man.

The ball began with a country-dance, always the first dance at these meetings, the Vicar of Layton opening it with Miss Sterling. He had just been presented to the living--a very poor one, by the way--and as yet knew but few of his parishioners personally; he was a young man, and enjoyed the dancing as much as anybody. Next to them stood young Mr. Grame and Selina Cleeve, by far the handsomest couple in the room. Mrs. Sterling sat in an arm-chair by the fire, looking pale and delicate, and by her side sat the new vicar's mother, who had come to Layton to keep house for him. The farmer, as he had threatened, was in the kitchen, smoking his pipe, a knot of elderly friends round him doing the same and discussing the state of the markets; but as they were all in full dress (blue frock-coats with brass buttons, drab breeches and gaiters, and crimson neckties), their presence in the ball-room might with certainty be looked for by-and-by.

It was nine o'clock when John Ledbitter entered, in evening dress. Some of the young farmers nudged each other. "He's come to take the shine out of Grame," they whispered. He did take the shine out of him; for though young Grame could boast of his good looks and fine figure, he was not half so popular as John Ledbitter. John made his way at once to Mrs. Sterling and spoke with her a little while. He had a pleasant voice, and the accent and address of a cultivated man. Mrs. Cooper, the clergyman's mother, looked after him as he moved away to take his place in the dance. She inquired who he was.

"It is John Ledbitter," said Anne Sterling.

"I thought--dear me, what an extraordinary likeness!" said the Reverend Mr. Cooper, following John with his eyes--"how like that gentleman is to the man who drives the mail-cart! I was noticing the man this morning as he drove into Layton; he appeared to manage his horse so skilfully."

"John Ledbitter is the driver of the mail-cart," interposed Walter Grame, drawing himself up, as much as to say that he would not stoop to drive a mail-cart.

"I must explain it to you," said Mrs. Sterling, noting the perplexed look of the clergyman. "Old Mr. Ledbitter, John's father, was an architect and land-agent in Higham. He had the best business connection in all the county, but his large family kept his profits down, for he reared them expensively and never laid by. So that when he died they had to shift for themselves. John, the third son, had been brought up an agriculturist, and obtained a post as manager to the estate of a gentleman who lived much abroad. However, the owner sold the property, and John lost his situation. This was--how long ago, Anne?"

"About four months, mother."

"Yes; and he had held it about three years. Well, poor John could not immediately get into anything: one promised him something, and another promised him something, but no place seemed to drop in. One day he had come over to see Sir Geoffrey Adams on business, and was standing by the post-office here, when the driver of the mail-cart fell down in a fit, just as he was about to start, and died. There was nobody to drive the cart back to Higham; the afternoon was flying on, and the chances were that the Layton and Weirford letters would lose the mail. So John Ledbitter said he would drive it; and he did so, and got the bags to Higham in time."

"He drove to and fro the next day, and for several days," interposed Walter Grame, who had appeared anxious to speak, "nobody turning up, at the pinch, to whom we chose to entrust the bags. So my father, in a joke, told Ledbitter he had better keep the place; and, by Jupiter! if he didn't nail it! The chaffing's not over in Higham yet. Ledbitter can't walk through the streets but he gets in for it. And serve him right: the fellow can expect nothing but chaff, if he chooses to degrade himself to the level of a mail-cart driver."

"It is not the pay he does it for, which is trifling, but he argues that idleness is the root of mischief; and this daily occupation keeps him out of both," said Anne, looking at Walter Grame. "He has only taken it as a temporary thing, until something better falls in."

"Ledbitter's one in a thousand," rang out the bluff voice of George Blount, a keen-looking young farmer who had just come up from the card-room; "and there's not one in a thousand that would have had the moral courage to defy pride and put his shoulder to the wheel as he has done. Is it not more to his credit to take up with this honest employment, and live on the pay while he's waiting for a place to drop from the clouds, than to skulk idly about Higham, and sponge upon his brothers? You dandy town bucks may turn up your noses at him for it, Master Grame, but he has shown himself a downright sensible man. What do you think, sir?" added the speaker, abruptly addressing the clergyman.

"It certainly appears to me that this young Mr. Ledbitter is to be commended," was the reply. "I see no reflection that can be cast upon him for driving the mail-cart while he waits for something more suitable to his sphere of life," And Anne Sterling's cheeks coloured with pleasure as she heard the words. She knew the worth of John Ledbitter: perhaps too well.

"He'll get on fast," cried young Blount; "these steady-minded, persevering fellows are safe to rise in the world. In twenty years' time from this, if John Ledbitter has not won himself a home and twenty thousand pounds, it will surprise me."

"I am glad to hear this opinion from you, Mr. Blount, for I think you are capable of judging," observed Mrs. Sterling. "People tell me there is an attachment between John Ledbitter and my niece; so that we--if it is to come to anything--should naturally be interested in his getting on."

"I hope that is quite a mistaken idea, ma'am; and I think it is," fired Walter Grame. "You would never suffer Miss Cleeve to throw herself away on him! There are others--"

Mrs. Sterling made a motion for silence, for the quadrille was over, and the two persons in question were approaching. Selina seated herself by her aunt, and the clergyman entered into conversation with John Ledbitter. Presently the music struck up again.

"It is my turn now, Selina," whispered Walter Grame.

She shook her head in an unconcerned manner, as she toyed with a spray of heliotrope. "I am engaged to Mr. Ledbitter."

"That is too bad," retorted Walter Grame, resentfully. "You danced with him the last dance."

"And I have promised him this. How unreasonable you are, Mr. Walter! I have danced with you--let me think--three times already."

Mr. Ledbitter turned from the vicar, and, without speaking, took Selina's hand, and placed it within his arm. But after they moved away, he leaned down to whisper to her. There was evidently perfect confidence between them.

"I think it is so--that they are attached to each other," remarked Mrs. Cooper, who was watching them. "I hope their prospects will--Oh, goodness! my best black silk gown!"

"It will not hurt; it is only white wine negus. Anne, get a cloth; call Molly," reiterated Mrs. Sterling. For Mr. Walter Grame's refreshment glass and its contents had fallen from his hand on the skirt of Mrs. Cooper's dress as it lay on the floor. Anne said nothing, then or afterwards, but her impression was that it was thrown down, and in passion. The glass lay in fragments.

Higham great market was being held; the first in the new year. This was only a few days after the party. Amongst other farmers who attended the market was Mr. Sterling. About three o'clock in the afternoon, when his business was over, he went into the post-office. The postmaster and his son were both there, the latter sitting down and reading the newspaper. It was not a busy hour.

"Good-day, Mr. Grame," said the farmer. "Good-day, Master Walter. I have come about that letter. I do think it must be lost. It never was so late before, that I can recollect."

"What letter?" inquired the postmaster.

"Why, that letter--with the fifty pounds in it. I don't expect any other. You are sure you have not overlooked it?"

"The letter went to Layton days ago," responded Mr. Grame. "Did you not receive it?"

Farmer Sterling's eyes opened wide with perplexity.

"Went to Layton days ago!" he repeated. "Where is it, then?"

"If you have not had it, there must be some mismanagement at the Layton office. But such neglect is unusual with Marsh."

"Good mercy! I hope it has not been stolen."

"Which morning was it the letter came, Walter?" cried Mr. Grame, appealing to his son. "Oh--I remember--the day you and the girls were going over to the Hill House Farm. It was the very morning of your wife's ball, Mr. Sterling."

"The morning before, or the morning after?" asked the bewildered farmer.

"The same morning, the 6th of January. When Walter and the two girls went over in the evening."

"Now, why didn't you tell me that night that it was come, Mr. Walter?" expostulated the fanner.

"I never thought of the letter," replied the young man. "And if I had thought of it, it would only have been to suppose you had received it. You ought to have had it that afternoon. Had you happened to mention the letter, I could have told you it was come."

"Now look at that!" groaned the farmer. "What with the people and the eating and drinking, the letter never came into my head at all. Are you quite sure, Mr. Grame, that it was the very letter?"

"I am sure that it was a letter addressed to you, and that it came from London. I made the remark to Walter that your letter was come at last. I have not the slightest doubt it was the letter."

"And you sent it on to Layton?"

"Of course I did."

"But Miss Cleeve called at our post-office yesterday, and Marsh assured her no letter at all had arrived for me."

"I put it into the Layton bag myself, and secured the bag myself, as I always do," returned Mr. Grame, "and the bag was never out of my hands till I delivered it to John Ledbitter. My son was present and saw me put it in."

"I was," said Walter. "When my father exclaimed that Mr. Sterling's letter had come at last, I looked over his shoulder at the address, and I saw him drop it into the bag. They must have overlooked it at the Layton office, sir."

"Old Marsh is so careful a body," debated the farmer.

"He is," assented Mr. Grame. "I don't suppose he ever overlooked a letter in his life. Still such a thing may occur. Go to the office as soon as you return, Mr. Sterling, and tell him from me that the letter went on to Layton."

"It's a jolly vexatious thing to have all this bother. If that fifty-pound note's gone, it will be my loss. Mr. Cleeve objected to send in that way, but I told him I'd run the risk."

And perhaps here lay the secret of Farmer Sterling's anxiety about the safe arrival of these letters--because he knew that the forwarding of the money in this way was in defiance of other people's opinion.

The letter never reached Layton--so old Mr. Marsh, the postmaster there, affirmed, when applied to by the farmer.

He remembered perfectly the 6th--why, it was not a week ago--the day he told Ledbitter of the accident to the bay mare. No soul but himself touched the letters; nobody but himself was present that day when he opened the bag; and he could swear that the letter for Farmer Sterling was not in it. Mr. Marsh's word was a guarantee in itself: he had held the situation two score years, and was perfectly trustworthy.

So the suspicion fell upon John Ledbitter. Indeed, it may not be too much to say that the guilt was traced home to him. The postmasters of Higham and Layton were known and tried public servants, above all suspicion: the one had put the letter in and secured the bag; the other, when he opened the bag, found the letter gone; and none could or did have access to the bag between those times but John Ledbitter. He was dismissed from his situation as driver; but, strange to say, he was not brought to trial. Mr. Sterling declined to prosecute, and no instructions were received on the subject front the Government; but John Ledbitter's guilt was as surely brought home to him as it could have been by twelve jurymen. Of course he made protest of his innocence--what man, under a similar accusation, does not?--but his crime was too palpable. Neither the letter nor its enclosure could be traced. Mr. Cleeve furnished the particulars of the lost note; it was stopped at the London and country banks, handbills describing it were also hung up in the different public-houses: but it was not presented for payment, and was never heard of. "Saucy Sir must have ate it up with his hay" quoth the joking farmers of Layton, one to another: but if they accidentally met the gentleman driver--as they were wont to style John Ledbitter--they regarded him with an aspect very different from a joking one.

John Ledbitter entered Mr. Sterling's house only once after this, and that was to resign Selina Cleeve; to release her from the tacit engagement which existed between them. However, he found there was little necessity for doing so: Selina released herself. He arrived at the Hill House for this purpose at an inopportune moment; for his rival--as he certainly aspired to be--was there before him.

It was Sunday, and when Mr. Sterling and his family got home from church in the morning they found Walter Grame there, who had ridden over from Higham. He received an invitation to remain and partake of their roast griskin and apple-pie. After dinner, the farmer took his pipe, his wife lay back in her cushioned arm-chair on the opposite side of the hearth-rug; and while Anne presided over the wine--cowslip, sherry and port--and the filberts and cakes, Walter Grame watched Selina. The conversation turned upon John Ledbitter and his crime.

"I do not see how he could accomplish it," exclaimed Mrs. Sterling, "unless he stopped the mail-cart, and undid the bag in the road."

"Well, what was there to prevent his doing so?" responded her husband.

"But so deliberate a theft," repeated Mrs. Sterling. "I can understand--at least, I think I can--the being overcome by a moment of temptation; but a man who could stop his horse in a public road, unlock the box, and untie the letterbag for the purpose of robbing it, must be one who would stand at scarcely any crime."

"Why, that's just what I told him," cried the farmer, "when he came to me at Higham, wanting to make a declaration of his innocence. 'What's gone with the letter and the money,' I said, 'if you have not got it, Mr. Ledbitter?' And that shut him up; for all he could answer was that he wished he knew what had gone with it."

"Ah," broke in Walter Grame, "Ledbitter was a great favourite, but I did not like him. And Higham never noticed until now the singularity of his having taken to drive a mail-cart. It is the opinion of more than one man that the robbery was planned when he secured the place."

"What, to take that same identical letter of mine?" gasped the farmer, laying his pipe on his knee, while a startled look of dismay rose to Anne Sterling's face.

"Not yours in particular, Mr. Sterling. But probably yours happened to be the first letter that presented itself, as bearing an enclosure worth the risk."

"The villain! the double-faced rascal!" uttered the farmer. "That's putting the matter--and himself too--in a new light."

At that moment Molly entered the room with some silver forks and spoons, large and small, and shut the door behind her.

"It's him," she abruptly said, coming up to the table, with a face of terror. "He says he wants to see Miss Selina."

"Who does?" demanded everybody, in a breath.

"That dreadful young Ledbitter. He come sneaking in at the kitchen door: not the front way, or you'd have seen him from this winder, but right across the fold-yard. I was took all of a heap, and asked if he'd walk into the parlour--for I was afeard of him. 'No,' says he, 'I'll not go in. Is Miss Cleeve there?'

"'Yes, she is,'I said, 'and the mistress, and Miss Anne, and the master, and Mr. Walter Grame: and Joan's close at hand, a-skimming the cream.' For I thought he should know I was not alone in the place, if he had come to steal anything.

'Molly,' says he, quite humbly, 'go in and ask Miss Cleeve if she will step out and speak a word with me.' So I grabbed up the dinner silver, which, by ill-luck, was lying on the table, and away I came."

Miss Cleeve rose. "Selina! " said Mrs. Sterling, in a reproving tone.

"Aunt," was the rejoinder, "I have also a word to say to him."

"But--my dear! Well, well, just for a minute, if you must. But remember, Selina, we cannot again admit Mr. Ledbitter."

"I'd as soon admit the public hangman," declared the farmer.

Scarcely had Selina left the room, when Walter Grame darted after her. He drew her into the best parlour, the door of which, adjacent to their sitting-room, stood open.

"Selina! you will never accord an interview to this man?"

"Yes," she answered. "For the last time."

"What infatuation! Do you believe in him still?"

"That is impossible," she murmured, looking wretchedly ill, and also wretchedly cross. "But, from the terms we were on, a last interview, a final understanding, is necessary."

"What terms?" he asked, biting his lips. "It cannot be that you were engaged to him?"

"Not really engaged. But, had it not been for this, had Ledbitter remained what I thought he was, we should soon have been."

"I am grieved to hear it. It is a lucky escape for you."

"Oh! and it is this which makes me so angry," she bitterly exclaimed. "Why did he monopolise my society, seek to make me like him, when he knew himself to be a base, bad man. I, who might have chosen from all the world! Let me go, Mr. Grame: I shall be more myself, when this last interview is over."

"You can have nothing to say to him, Selina, that may not be said by a friend," he persisted. "Suffer me to see him for you."

"Nonsense," she peevishly answered. "You cannot say what I have to say."

She walked, with a hasty step, along the passage. The two servants were whispering in the kitchen; but Selina could see no sign of Mr. Ledbitter. Molly pointed with her finger towards the door of the best kitchen, and Selina went into it.

In the middle of the cold, comfortless room, which had no fire in it, stood John Ledbitter. She walked up, and confronted him without speaking, her action and countenance expressing both anger and scorn.

"I see," began Mr. Ledbitter, as he looked at her. "I need not have come from Higham to do my errand this afternoon. It has been done for me."

"I feel it cold in this room," said Selina, glancing round, and striving, pretty successfully, to hide the agitation she really felt under a show of indifference. "Be so good as to tell me your business--that I may return to the fire."

"My business was, partly to see how this false accusation had affected you towards me: I see it too plainly now. Had it been otherwise--"

He stopped: either from emotion, or was at a loss to express himself. She stood as still as a statue, and did not help him on.

"Then I have only to say farewell," he resumed, "and to thank you for the many happy hours we have spent together. I came to say something else: but no matter: I see now it would be useless."

"And I beg," she said, raising herself proudly up, "that you will forget those hours you speak of, and which I shall never reflect on but with a sense of degradation. I blush--I blush," she vehemently repeated, "to think that the world may point to me, as I pass through the streets, and say, 'There goes she who was engaged to the man, John Ledbitter!' I pray that I may never see your face again."

"You never shall--by my seeking. Should I ever hold converse with you again willingly, it will be under different auspices."

He quitted the room, stalked through the kitchen, and across the fold-yard into the side- lane, his breast heaving with passionate anger; for she had aroused all the lion within him. Molly and Joan pressed their noses against the kitchen window, and stared after him till he was beyond view; just as they might have stared had some extraordinary foreign animal been on view there, and with quite as much curiosity. Whilst Selina Cleeve, repelling some softer emotions, which seemed inclined to make themselves felt within her, strove to shake John Ledbitter out of her thoughts, and to say to herself, as she returned to the sitting-room, that she had shaken him out of them for ever.

The years passed on, nearly two, and the postmaster at Higham became stricken with mortal illness. His disease was a lingering one, lasting over several months, during which time he was confined to his bed, and his son managed the business. One evening just before his death, when Walter was sitting in the room, the old man suddenly addressed him.

"Walter," he said, "I shall soon be gone, and after that they will no doubt make you postmaster. Be steady, punctual, diligent in your daily business, as I trust I have been; be just and merciful in your dealings with your fellow-men, as I have striven to be; be more urgent than I have ever been in serving your Maker, for there the very best of us fall short. You have been a dutiful son to me; a good son; and I pray that your children, in your old age, may be such to you."

Walter moved uneasily in his chair.

"There is only one thing in business matters which causes me regret for the past," resumed Mr. Grame--"that the particulars connected with John Ledbitter's theft should never have come to light. It is a weight on my conscience, having suffered him to assume a post for which his position unfitted him. If he sought it with the intention of doing wrong, my having refused him the situation would have removed the temptation from his way."

"You need not worry yourself over such a crotchet as that, father," responded the younger man. "I cannot think why he does not leave the country. The thing would be done with then, and pass from men's minds."

"He has his punishment," observed Mr. Grame. "Abandoned by his relations, scorned by his friends, shunned by all good men, and driven to get his living in the fields as a day-labourer! Many a man would sink under it."

"He is a great fool to stay in Highamshire."

"No harsh names, Walter: John Ledbitter did not offend against you. Leave him to the stings of his own conscience."

Walter muttered some reply, and quitted the room. He never liked to be found fault with, in ever so small a degree.

During his absence, Mr. Grame dropped asleep and dreamt a very vivid dream. So vivid, that, in the first moments of waking up, he could not be persuaded it was not reality. The subject must have been suggested by the previous conversation. He dreamt that John Ledbitter was innocent: he did not see or understand how, but in his sleep he felt the most solemn conviction that the fact was so.

"Walter, Walter," he gasped forth, after his confused relation of it, upon the return of his son, "when his innocence is brought to light, do you try and make it up to him. I would, if I were alive."

"When his innocence--what do you mean, sir? You must be asleep still. A dream is but a dream."

"Well--if it comes to light, if it shall be proved that John Ledbitter is an innocent and injured man, do you endeavour to compensate him for the injustice that has been heaped on his head. It is a charge I leave you."

"The old man is wandering," whispered Mr. Walter to the nurse, who was then present.

"Like enough," answered the woman: and it was through her that this dream of the postmaster's got talked of in Higham. "Like enough he is, poor gentleman. Let me give you your composing draught, sir."

A goodly company were wending their way to Layton church, for the fairest flower in Layton parish was that day to be taken out of it. A stranger, who happened to be passing through Layton, stepped into the church with the crowd.

"She is a bonny bride," he observed to old Farmer Blount, who stood in the porch looking in.

"Ay, she is that. Some of the young men about here have been wild after her; but Walter Grame has distanced them. He is not bad-looking either, for a man."

"Extremely handsome, I think. Who is he?"

"The postmaster of Higham; as his father was before him. The old man died a year ago, and left a goodish bit of property behind him; hut it turned out that Master Walter there had anticipated his share; and how the young fellow had kept his creditors quiet was a matter of wonder. But he has sown his wild oats now, they say; and unless he had, Miss Cleeve, I take it, would have seen him further before she'd married him. Her father's dead also, and there's fifteen hundred pounds told down with her this day."

"He is a lucky dog."

"It is sheer luck with him, for he was not her first fancy. Young Ledbitter was; and she was mighty fond of him. But he ran his head into trouble--robbed the Layton mailbag. Of course, no decent young woman could stand that, though he slipped out of a prosecution. Since then he has been thankful to any farmer who would give him a job of work. He is on my grounds now."

The stranger gave a low whistle, forgetting he was in the porch of a church. "Is it not hazardous, sir, to employ a thief even on your out-door land?"

"Well, you see, the Ledbitters were so much respected; people cannot help feeling for them. A likelier, steadier young fellow than John was, one could not expect to meet. I say it must have been a moment of sudden madness, or some other sort of temptation. But he has got his treadmill on him: there's not a mad dog in the parish more shunned than he. Hush! Here they come."

Mr. Walter Grame and his bride, no longer Selina Cleeve, walked first; next came Anne Sterling with her father. Several friends followed. The two young ladies were dressed alike, in lavender silk, it was the custom then, the bride wearing orange-blossoms in her white bonnet; Anne, lilies of the valley. They brushed the stranger as they walked through the porch, so that he--to use his own expression--had a good look at them.

"She's a regular beauty," he remarked to Farmer Blount; "but for my choice give me the one that follows her, the bridesmaid. The first has a temper of her own, or I never read an eye yet; the last has goodness written on her face."

Mr. Blount grunted forth an inaudible reply. None were more aware of Anne Sterling's goodness than the Blounts. George had proposed to her in secret the night of the ball, three years before, and she refused him.

But another person was also looking on at the bridal party; a man in a smock-frock; looking through a gap in the hedge, from an obscure corner of the churchyard. It was John Ledbitter. Oh, what a position was this unfortunate man's! Guilt does, indeed, bring its own punishment--as all Layton, and Higham too, had repeated, with reference to him, hundreds of times. Hunted down by his own class in life, condemned to labour hard for common sustenance with the hinds who tilled the ground--for in any more responsible situation, in an office, or where money would have passed through his hands, none would trust him--there he stood, a marked man, watching her, whom he had once so passionately loved, led forth, the bride of another. A bitter word rose in his heart for that hour when he had first ascended the mail-cart to drive it to Layton; and with a wild cry, which startled the air, and seemed to be wrung from the very depths of his spirit, he leaped the stile at the rear of the churchyard, and rushed back to his labour in the fields.

This statement, of the obloquy thrown upon John Ledbitter (as he is here called) and the manner in which he was shunned, is not exaggerated in the slightest degree. As those who are old enough to remember the circumstances well know.

A few years had gone by.

It was the dinner hour at Hill House Farm, an hour after midday. Mr. Sterling and his daughter sat down to it alone. Latterly the farmer had been ailing in health and could not look much after his out-door pursuits. People thought it singular that the farmer's only child, who was admired wherever she was known, and who would be the inheritor of his substance, no small one, should have gained her six-and-twentieth year without having changed her name; but she laughingly answered, when joked about it, that she could not afford to leave her father and mother.

"Shall I carve to-day, father, or will you?" inquired Anne.

"You carve, child. Cut for your mother first."

But Anne chose first of all to help her father. The dish was boiled beef, and she was careful to cut it for him as he best liked it. She then rose to take up her mother's dinner.

"Why are you leaving the table, Anne? Where's Molly, that she's not waiting on us?"

"Molly has Martha's work to do to-day as well as her own," replied Anne. "I shall be back directly."

When dinner was over, the farmer drew his arm-chair close to the fire. Anne gave him his pipe and tobacco, set his small jug of ale and glass beside him, and then went up to her mother's chamber. She smoothed the bed and the pillows, changed her mother's cap for a smarter one, in case any neighbours dropped in, put some lavender-water on her handkerchief, and gave her her usual glass of wine.

"What else can I do, mother?"

"Nothing, my dear. Sit down and be still. You must be tired, helping Molly so much this morning. Unless you will read a psalm. The book is here."

Anne Sterling took the Prayer-book, and read the evening psalms for the day in her clear and pleasant tone. She then sat talking. After a while, her mother seemed inclined to sleep; so Anne softly left the room, and went down to the kitchen. It was then four o'clock.

"Well, Molly, how are you getting on?"

"Oh, pretty well," crossly responded the old servant, who was not so active since a hurt she had given to her knee; "Martha hadn't need to go gadding for a holiday every day."

"Is my father gone out?"

"I have not seen anything of him since dinner, Miss Anne."

Anne went into the dining-room. Soon a wild cry echoed in the passages. Molly ran in as quickly as her lame knee would permit.

Mr. Sterling was in a fit. His pipe lay broken on the ground; his head had fallen on the elbow of his chair; froth issued from his lips. Molly screamed out that it was apoplexy.

"He will die, Miss Anne, unless something can be done. How in the world can we get the doctor here?" For the indoor man was absent: and no labourers that they knew of were near the house.

Anne Sterling, pale as a sheet, gathered her scared senses together. "I will run into Layton for the doctor," she said; "you would never get there. Hold his head up, Molly, and rub his hands while I am gone."

She darted off without bonnet or shawl across the fold-yard into the lane, which was the nearest way to the little town of Layton, flying along as if for her life. It was dirty, and the mud splashed up with every step. A stalwart labourer, at work in a smock-frock in an adjacent field, stared at her with astonishment, and then strode to the stile.

"Oh," she cried, as she darted up to him, her heart leaping at the sight of a human being, one who might perhaps be of service, "if you can run quicker than I, pray go for me into Layton. My father--I--I did not notice that it was you," she abruptly broke off; "I beg your pardon." And, swifter if possible than before, she flew on her way down the lane.

He was scarcely more than thirty years of age, yet lines of care were in his face, and silver was mixed with his luxuriant hair, but his countenance was open and pleasant to look upon. A tall agile man, he leaped the stile at a bound, and overtook Anne.

"Miss Sterling! Miss Sterling!" he impressively said, as he came up with her, "you are in some distress." And, strange to say--strange when contrasted with his dress and his menial occupation--his words and bearing were those of an educated and well-bred man. "Though it is I--myself; though I am a banned, persecuted outcast, need that neutralize any aid I can render? Surely no curse will follow that. What can I do for you?"

She hesitated; feeling that she could not run as quickly as he could. What though John Ledbitter was pointed to among his fellow-men as a criminal who, by luck, not merit, had escaped the galleys, was not her father dying for want of aid? Yes, she would waive prejudice at this time of need.

"My father is in a fit," she panted. "If you can get Mr. Jelf to him quicker than I can, we should be very thankful to you. I fear it is apoplexy."

"Apoplexy!" he repeated; "then no time should be lost in the treatment. It must be half-an-hour before Mr. Jelf can be with him, even should he be at home. Mr. Sterling must be bled instantly. Is there any one in the house who can do it?"

She shook her head as she ran on. "Not a soul is in the house but Molly. Except my mother--who is bedridden."

"Then I had better go back to your house--if it may be permitted me to enter it;" and he spoke the last words with conscious indecision. "I may be able to do something: if you can go on for Mr. Jelf."

"Be it so," she answered. "Lose no time."

He sped back swiftly, and entered the house by way of the kitchen. He knew the locality well. There was no one about; but he heard the voice of Molly--he remembered that well, also--calling, in a sobbing tone, to know who had come in.

She started when she saw who it was. A look of blank dismay, not unmixed with resentment, overspread her countenance.

"What do you want, Master Ledbitter? What brings you here?"

"I am come to render aid--if any be in my power. By Miss Sterling's desire," he added distinctly. "By the time the doctor can get here he would be past aid," he continued, looking at the unfortunate man. "Get me a washhandbasin, and some linen to make a bandage. Have you any hot water?"

"Plenty of it," sobbed Molly.

"We must get his feet into it then. Bring in all the mustard you have in the house, while I take off his shoes and stockings. Make haste. We may restore him yet."

John Ledbitter spoke with an air of authority; and Molly to her own astonishment obeyed, much as she despised him. Little time lost he. There was no lancet at hand, but he bared the farmer's arm, and used his own sharp penknife. He was an intelligent man, and knew something of surgery; and when Anne Sterling returned she found her father had been rescued from immediate danger. Mr. Jelf was not with her: he was on the other side of Layton, visiting a patient, but they had sent after him. A neighbour or two returned with Anne.

"He is not in favour with honest folk, that John Ledbitter," remarked Molly, when she came in, "but as sure as we are sinful creatures, you may thank him, Miss Anne, that you have yet a living father. The master was at the last gasp."

He did more, besides restoring him. He was strong and active, and with a little help from the women, he got Mr. Sterling upstairs, undressed him, and placed him in bed, "I will remain and watch him, with your permission," he said, looking at Anne, "until the surgeon comes."

"If you will kindly do so," she answered. "I am very grateful to you; indeed I am," she added, through her tears, as she held out her hand to him. "My mother will not know how to thank you, when she hears that to you, under Heaven, he owes his life."

Mr. Ledbitter did not take her offered hand. He extended his own, and turned it round from side to side, as if to exhibit its horny, rough texture, bearing the impress of hard out-door work, whilst a peculiar smile of mockery and bitterness rose to his face.

"It is not so fitting as it once was to come into contact with a lady's," he observed; "these last six years have left their traces on it. You would say also, as the world says, that worse marks than those of work are on it--that it bears the impress of its crime, as Cain bore his."

She looked distressed. What was there that she could answer?

"And yet, Anne--pardon me, the familiar name rose inadvertently, not from disrespect: I used to call you so, and you have never since, in my mind, been anything but Anne Sterling--what if I were to assert that the traces of rough usage are the worst guilt of which that hand can righteously be accused; that it is dyed with no deeper crime? What then?"

"I don't know," she faltered.

"I do," he answered. "You would throw my assertion to the winds, as others threw it, and leave me to toil and blanch and die in those winds, rather than accord me the sympathy so necessary from man to man, even though it were but the sympathy of pity. A messenger from Heaven might whisper such to a fallen angel."

The reproach of crime had lain upon John Ledbitter for more than six long years. Suitable employment would be accorded him by none; nobody would look at him or trust him. His motive for remaining in the locality could not be fathomed. Had he gone elsewhere, abroad for instance, he might have assumed his former standing and got on. But he did not go.

Mr. Sterling got better. But only for a short time: hardly long enough, as the old gentleman himself said, to make his peace with his Maker. He never left his bed again. Mrs. Sterling, whose disorder appeared to abate, and her strength to revive with the necessity of the case, now managed to reach her husband's room, and to sit with him for several hours daily.

About three weeks subsequent to the farmer's attack, his daughter went to Higham by the morning coach, to see her cousin, Mrs. Grame. As she entered the passage of the house, the office was on her right, and Mr. Grame was there, stamping letters. He had succeeded to the postmastership when his father died. Anne waited a moment, thinking he might see her, and she observed that his eyes were red, and his hands shaking.

"Good-morning, Walter," she said. "Is Selina upstairs?"

The postmaster looked up. "What, is it you, Anne? You have just come, I suppose. How is your father?"

"He is better, but gains no strength, and does not get up. This is the first day he has seemed sufficiently comfortable for me to leave him, or I should have been in to see Selina before."

"And I have been so bothered with one thing or other that I have not had a minute's leisure to ride over. What tale's that, about Ledbitter having saved his life?"

"He certainly did save it. My father must have been dead before the surgeon came, had it not been for John Ledbitter. He applied the necessary remedies, and bled him, as handily and effectually as Mr. Jelf could have done."

"Ah, women are easily frightened," carelessly repeated the postmaster. "We heard that you came across Ledbitter as you were running into Layton for Jelf."

"It was so."

"Well, then I must tell you, Anne, that I contradicted that report. For I never could have believed you would permit yourself to hold speech with the man, still less admit him inside the house."

"Not to save my father?" returned Anne. "I would use any means, any instrument, when his life was at stake."

"You did not know it would save his life," persisted Mr. Grame. "I am astonished at your imprudence, Anne."

"My father was dying for want of assistance," she retorted, warmly. "I am thankful that Providence threw even John Ledbitter in my way to render it."

"Providence?" sarcastically ejaculated the postmaster.

"Providence," quietly repeated Anne. "The longer I live, the more plainly do I see the hand of Providence in all the actions of our lives. Even in those which to us may appear insignificantly trivial."

"You will avow yourself a fatalist next," rejoined the postmaster.

"How is the baby?" inquired Anne, to turn the conversation.

"Oh, it's well enough, if one may judge by its crying. I never heard a young one with such lungs. I think Selina must manage it badly. You will find them all upstairs."

She went up to the sitting-rooms, and then up again to Mrs. Grame's bedchamber, and knocked at the door. But there was so great a noise within of children crying, that she had little chance of being heard, and opened it. Mrs. Grame sat in a rocking-chair, in an invalid wrapper and shawl, her countenance pale and worn, presenting a painful contrast to that of the once blooming and lovely Selina Cleeve. The infant in her arms was crying, as if in pain; another little fellow, of two years, stood by her knee, roaring with temper.

Anne went up and kissed her. "What are you doing here, with these crying children, Selina?"

"Oh, dear, do try and quiet them, Anne!" Mrs. Grame helplessly uttered, bursting into tears; "my very life is harassed out of me. Since the nurse left, I have the trouble of them all day."

Anne threw her bonnet and shawl on the bed; and, taking a paper of home-made cakes from her pocket, drew the elder child's eye towards them. The tears were arrested halfway; the noise ceased.

"These cakes are for good little boys who don't cry," said Anne, seating the young gentleman on the floor, and putting some into his pinafore. Then she took the infant from its mother, and carried it about the room. When soothed to silence and sleep, she sat down with it on her knee.

"Selina," she began, "I am not going to tell you now that you are a bad manager, for I have told you that often enough when you were well. But how comes it that you have no nurse?"

"Ask Walter," replied Mrs. Grame, a flood of resentment in her tone.

"Now be calm, and speak quietly of things. I heard your children's maid had left, but you surely purpose taking another."

"I purpose!" bitterly retorted Mrs. Grame; "it is of very little use what I purpose or want. Walter squanders the money away on his own pleasures, and we cannot afford to keep two servants. Now you have the plain truth, Anne."

"I have thought," resumed Miss Sterling, after an awkward pause, "that you have sometimes appeared not quite at your ease as to money. But this is a case of necessity: your health is at stake. It is Mr. Grame's duty to provide an additional servant."

"Listen, Anne," resumed Mrs. Grame, speaking with an excitement her cousin in vain endeavoured to arrest. "You thought I married well: that if Walter had been living freely, as a young man, and anticipated his inheritance, he was steady then, had a good home to bring me to, and a liberal salary. You thought this--my uncle and aunt thought it--I thought it. But what were the facts? Before that child was born"--and she pointed to the little cake-eater--"I found he was over head and ears in debt; and the debts have been augmenting ever since. His quarter's salary, when paid, only serves to stop the most pressing of them, and to supply his private expenses, of which he appears to have an abundance. Such expenses are shameful for a married man."

"Be calm, Selina."

"Calm! how can I be calm? I wish I had never seen him! I wish I had been a thousand miles off, before I consented to marry him! I never did love him. Don't look reprovingly at me, Anne; it is the truth. I loved but one, and that was John Ledbitter. When he turned out worthless, I thought my heart would have broken, though I carried it off with a high hand, for I was bitterly incensed against him. Then came Walter Grame, with his insinuating whispers and his handsome face, and talked me into a liking for him. And then into a marriage--"

"Selina," interrupted Anne, "you should not speak so of your husband, even to me."

"I shall speak to the world, perhaps, by-and-by: he tries me enough for it. Night after night, night after night, since from a few months after our marriage, does he spend away from me. He comes home towards morning, sometimes sober, sometimes staggering from what he has taken. Beast!"

Anne could not stem the torrent of passion. Selina had always been excitable.

"I should not so much care now, for I have grown inured to it; and my former reproaches--how useless they were!--have given place to silent scorn and hatred, were it not for the money these habits of his consume. Circumstances have grown very poor with us; of ready money there seems to be none: it is with difficulty we provide for our daily wants, for tradespeople refuse us credit. How then can I bring another servant into the house, when we can hardly keep the one we have?"

"This state of things must be killing her," thought Anne.

"What it will come to, I don't know," proceeded the invalid, "but a break-up seems inevitable, and then he will lose his situation as postmaster. In any case, I don't think he will keep it long, for if he could stave off pecuniary ruin, his health is so shattered that he is unfit to hold it. I now thank my dear aunt that she was firm in having my fifteen hundred pounds settled on myself. The interest of it is not much, but, when the worst comes, it may buy dry bread to keep me and these poor children from starvation, and pay for a garret to lodge in."

"Oh, Selina!" sighed Anne Sterling, as the tears ran down her cheeks, "how terribly you shock me!"

"I have never betrayed this to a human being till now. You may have thought me grown cold, capricious, ill-tempered--no doubt you have, Anne, often, when you have come here. Not long ago, you said how marriage seemed to have altered me. But now you see what I have had to try me, the sort of existence mine has been."

"What can I do for you? how can I help?" inquired Anne. "I would take little Walter home with me, and relieve you of him for a time, but my father's state demands perfect quiet in the house. Money, beyond a trifle, I have not, of my own, to offer: perhaps my mother, when she knows, will--"

"She must not know," vehemently interrupted Selina. "I forbid you to tell her, Anne--I forbid you to tell any one. As to money, if you were to put a hundred pounds down before me this minute, I would say throw it rather into the fire, for he would be sure to get scent of it, and squander it. No, let the crisis come. The sooner the better. Things may be smoother after it, or at any rate quieter; as it is, the house is dunned by creditors. Oh, Anne! if it were not for these children I would come back and find peace at the farm, if you would give me shelter. But now--to go from my own selfish troubles--tell me about my uncle. To think that it should be John Ledbitter, of all people, who came in to his help! Walter went on in a fine way about it, in one of his half-tipsy moods. He has an unconquerable hatred to him, as powerful as it is lasting. I suppose it arises from knowing I was once so much attached to him."

"Selina," returned Miss Sterling, lowering her voice, "you will say it is a strange fancy of mine; but, from a few words John Ledbitter spoke to me, the evening of my father's attack, I have been doubting whether he was guilty."

"What can you mean?" demanded Selina, with startling fervour. "What grounds have you for saying this? Did he assert his innocence?"

"On the contrary, he seemed rather to let me assume his guilt. He said, that of course I believed him guilty, as the rest of the world did, but then followed a hint that he could assert his innocence. His manner said more than his words. It was very peculiar, very resentfully independent, betraying the self-reliance of an innocent man smarting under a stinging sense of injury. I do believe--"

"Don't go on, Anne," interrupted Mrs. Grame, with a shiver. "If it should ever turn out that John Ledbitter was accused unjustly, that I, of all others, helped to revile and scorn him, my sum of misery would be complete: I think I should go mad or die. I suppose you have seen him but that once."

"Indeed we have. He called the next day, and Molly let him go up to see my father."

"In his smock-frock," interposed Mrs. Grame, in a derisive tone.

"We have never seen him in anything else, except on Sundays, and then, you know, he is dressed well. He comes every day now."

"No!"

"He proffered his services to me and my mother, if he could be of any use about the farm. We were at terrible fault for some one to replace my father, and a few things he undertook were so well executed that they led to more. Now he is regularly working for us."

"Not as bailiff?"

"No, not exactly as bailiff; but he looks after things generally during the bailiff's prolonged absence. He is no better, by the way, Selina: people often fall ill when they can be least spared."

Mrs. Grame leaned her head upon her hand and mused. "Is John much altered?" she asked.

"Oh yes. His hair is going grey, and his countenance has a look of care I never thought to see on one so smiling and sunny as was John Ledbitter's."

Anne Sterling returned to Layton that evening with sad and sorrowful thoughts; the more so, that she was forbidden to confide Selina's troubles to her mother. But she had little leisure to brood over them in the weeks ensuing. A change for the worse occurred in her father's state, and it was evident that his thread of life was worn nearly to its end. The farmer held many an anxious consultation with his wife and daughter touching his worldly affairs. It was intended that the farm should be given up after his death, but several months must elapse before that could be effected--and who was to manage the land in the mean time? One Sunday evening, in particular, Mr. Sterling seemed unusually restless and anxious on this score. His wife in vain besought him not to disturb himself--that she and Anne should manage very well, and that perhaps the bailiff's illness might take a turn.

"I should have died at ease could I have left a trustworthy manager," he persisted. "If Ledbitter had not the mark upon him, there's no one else I'd so soon have appointed. He is a first-rate farmer."

"Father," spoke Anne, timidly, "I by no means feel sure that John Ledbitter was guilty. A doubt of it lies in my mind."

"Now, why do you say that, Anne?"

"I judge by his manner and by some words he let fall. Of course--There he is," broke off Anne, seeing John Ledbitter advance, from her seat by the window. "I dare say he is coming to inquire after you."

"Let him come up," rejoined the farmer

Mr. Ledbitter entered. None, looking at him now, could suppose he had the brand of a thief upon him, still less that he was a common day-labourer. For he bore the stamp of a gentleman in his dress and manner--in his manly form and countenance. One of his sisters had died lately, and John went into mourning for her, though she, as the rest of the family, had cast him off. Mr. Sterling invited him to take a chair.

"John Ledbitter," began the farmer, "since I lay here I have had a great many things in my mind; that old business of yours is one of them; and a remark of Anne's has now brought an impulse over me to ask you, if you can, or will, make things clearer. It's all over now, however it might have been, but I should like to know the truth. I am a dying man, John Ledbitter, and it would be a rest to my mind."

A deep crimson dyed the face of John Ledbitter. Once, twice, he essayed to speak, and no words came, but when he did find speech it was that of a truthful, earnest-minded man.

"Six years ago--more now--when that happened, I denied my guilt to you, Mr. Sterling. I told you that I was innocent as you were; but you answered me derisively, making a mockery of what I said, and sneered me into silence. I was innocent."

"What!" gasped the farmer, whilst Mrs. Sterling rose into a more upright position on her pillowed chair.

"I have not often been guilty of telling a lie: never that I can now recall to my recollection," he resumed. "But I could no more dare to assert one to you, hovering, as you are, on the confines of the next world, than I could, were I myself on its confines. Sir, as I said then, I repeat to you now--I never knew what became of the letter or the money; I never saw or touched either. In the presence of God, I assert this."

"Then who did take it?" inquired the amazed farmer.

"I cannot tell; though my nights have been sleepless and my hair has grown grey with anxiety over this very question. Old Mr. Grame affirmed the letter was in the bag when he delivered it to me; Mr. Marsh affirmed it was not in the bag when I delivered it to him. They were both to be trusted; they were both above suspicion: but I will affirm that the bag between those points was never opened or touched, or the box of the mail-cart unlocked, except to take out the Weirford bag. It is a curious mystery, but a certainty has always rested upon me that time will unravel it."

"But why not have proclaimed your innocence then, as you have now?" inquired Mrs. Sterling.

"Dear madam, I did proclaim it," he answered, with emotion. "To my relatives, to my friends, to the postmasters, to Mr. Sterling; as earnestly, as solemnly, as I now assert it this day. Not one listened to me. I met, even from my own family, with nothing but disbelief and contumely. They were impressed with the conviction that my innocence was an impossibility. I do not blame them: I should myself so have judged another, accused under the same circumstances: and even she, who was more to me than my own life, joined in the scorn, and shook me off. I took an oath, a rash one, perhaps, that I would never leave the spot until my innocence was established. So I have lived since, shunned by, and shunning my equals; never ceasing, in secret, my endeavours to trace out the lost note: but as yet without success. I have spoken truth, Mr. Sterling."

"I do believe you have," murmured the dying man. "May God make up to you the persecutions you have endured, John Ledbitter!"

Farmer Sterling died a man of substance, worth a great many thousand pounds, and John Ledbitter discarded his smock-frock when he was appointed manager of the farm by Mrs. Sterling. And thus a few weeks went by.

The post-office at Higham was closed for the night, and its master sat drinking brandy-and-water in his sitting-room. It was only ten o'clock, and very early for him to be at home; but he had come in saying he was not well. Mrs. Grame sat by his side in a sullen state of rebellion. He had received his salary two days before, had locked it up in one of his iron safes, and had given her none of it. A desperate resolution was stealing over her--and the reader may justify or condemn her according to his judgment--that as soon as her husband should sleep she would go down to the office, and take some of this money for her pressing necessities.

"Where's the sugar?" inquired Mr. Grame.

"I have no sugar for you," she resentfully answered. "I told you this morning there was none for the baby."

The postmaster, in a jocular tone, for he had taken enough to drink already, consigned his wife and child to York, drank some brandy neat, and pulled open the sideboard cupboard in search of the sugar-basin. There it stood, full of moist sugar. So he paid his wife another worthy compliment,

"It is not yours," she exclaimed, "or meant for you. My cousin Anne was here to-day, and brought it for the baby."

He answered by dropping a liberal tea-spoonful of it into his glass. "And what news did Anne Sterling bring?" he said, in a mocking tone, as he lighted a cigar. "Fresh praises of their new manager, the thief Ledbitter?"

"It was not Ledbitter who was the thief; she told me that news," Mrs. Grame replied, in a raised, almost an hysterical voice; for Anne Sterling's information had had its effect upon her. "John Ledbitter was innocent; the crime was committed by another. I ought to have known that from the first."

A curious change came over Walter Grame. His face turned to a deadly whiteness, his cigar fell from his lips, his teeth for a moment chattered. "Ledbitter innocent!" he cried. "Did she say who took it? How did it come to light?"

"What is the matter with you?" asked his wife. "Are you so full of hatred to John Ledbitter, that hearing of his innocence should affect you in this manner?"

"Woman!" he retorted, in agitation, "I asked you how it came to light!"

"Nothing has come to light; except that just before my uncle's death Ledbitter convinced him of his innocence. I wish the real criminal was discovered," she impetuously continued: "I, for one, would aid in persecuting him to the death. Whoever he may be, he has been hugging himself under the ruin of poor John Ledbitter."

Mr. Grame laughed, a forced laugh, and stooped to pick up his crushed cigar, for he had put his foot on it when it fell burning to the carpet. "That's his sort of innocence, is it," he derisively observed; "his own assertion! Honest men want something else, Mrs. Grame."

But Selina saw that his teeth chattered still, and his hand shook so as scarcely to be able to lift the bottle, draughts from which he kept pouring into his glass. "How very singular!" she repeated to herself. It was not at all unusual for Walter Grame to be shaky and tottering; but this emotion, telling of fear, was unusual.

The spirit at length told upon Mr. Grame, and he sank down upon the sofa and slept, an unconscious man. Then, her lips pressed together with angry resolution, Mrs. Grame possessed herself of his keys and the key of the private office, which he always kept in his pocket, and stole downstairs.

She stood before the iron safe, the smaller safe--his, in his father's time--and tried the keys, several of the bunch, before she came to the right one. The moment it was unlocked, the door flew open and struck her on the forehead. A large bump rose instantly; she put up her hand and felt it. At any other time she would have been half-stunned by the shock; it was not heeded now.

Two cash-boxes and three small drawers were disclosed to view, and she had to try the keys again; each drawer opened with a different key. The first drawer was full of papers; in the second, as she drew it open, she saw no money, only one solitary letter lying at the end of it. An old letter, getting yellow now; still folded, but its seal broken. Its address was, "Mr. Sterling, Hill House Farm, Layton, Highamshire." A powerful curiosity excited her: she had recognized the, writing of her own father: what should bring a letter of his, addressed to her uncle, in this secret safe of Walter Grame's? As she opened the letter, something fell from it, and Mrs. Grame sank almost fainting on to a chair.

It was the long-lost letter and money, which John Ledbitter had been accused of stealing, the bank-note for fifty pounds. Had the letter been mislaid by old Mr. Grame, and overlooked till this day? she asked, in the first bewildering moment of discovery. Or had Walter acted the traitor's part, to bring disgrace upon Ledbitter? "The latter, oh! the latter," she convulsively uttered, when reason asserted its powers; "and I, who once so truly loved John Ledbitter, discarded him for this man!"

She made no further search for the gold--this discovery absorbed every care and thought. Securing the letter and note upon her person, she locked the safe again, sped upstairs, and shook her husband violently, pouring forth her indignant accusation. He struggled up on the sofa and stared at her: she herself was a curious object just then, with that dark mound standing out on her forehead, and her dangerous excitement. Then he began to shake and shiver, for he misunderstood her excited words, and comprehended that the officers of justice were after him. The fright partially sobered him, but he was half-stupefied still.

"Nobody can prosecute but you, Selina," he abjectly stammered, in his confused terror. "You will not refuse to hush it up for your husband."

"Tell me the truth, and you shall not be prosecuted," she vehemently answered, humouring his fears. "Did you do it on purpose to ruin John Ledbitter?"

"No, no," he uttered. "I was hard up; I was indeed, Selina. I did not know where to turn for money, and if my debts had come to the knowledge of the old man he would have disinherited me. So when this fifty pounds came before me, like a temptation, I took it. That's the whole truth."

"You took it," she repeated, "after it was given to John Ledbitter?"

"It never was given to him. As the master dropped it into the bag, some man came to the window with a question, and my father turned to answer him. It was Stone, the barber, I remember. I twitched the letter out then, and the master closed the bag and never know it. But I did not use it, Selina; the money's there now; I could not find an immediate opportunity of changing it away, and then such a hubbub was struck up that I never dared to change it. But I never thought then to harm Ledbitter."

"And I could make this man my husband!" she muttered, "the father of my unhappy children! Traitor! Coward! How dared you thrust yourself into the society of honest people?"

His only answer was to stagger to the table, and drink a deep draught of the spirit still standing on it. It revived his courage.

"Ha! ha! my old father had a dream a night or two before he died. He dreamed that Ledbitter was innocent, and charged me to make it up to him. Me! as if some inkling of the truth had penetrated to his brain. I did not like that dream: it has subdued me since whenever I have thought of it--and now it has come out. But there's one part, Selina, which is glorious to think of still--that it lost you to him, and gained you for me."

She might have struck him had she remained in the room longer, for her feelings were worked up to a pitch of exasperation bordering upon madness. She went upstairs, bolted herself in the chamber with her children, and threw herself, undressed, on the bed. Her husband did not attempt to follow her.

The next afternoon she was at Layton, entering the Hill House Farm. At the front gate she encountered John Ledbitter. "It is you I have come to see," she said.

Not for years had they met; and she spoke and looked so strangely that, but for her voice, he would scarcely have recognized her. He followed her in. Anne Sterling, who was in the parlour alone, rose from her seat in surprise, and inquired if all was well at Higham.

"Examine this, Mr. Ledbitter," was Mrs. Grame's only answer, drawing from her pocket the fatal letter. "Do you recognize it?"

Not at first did he understand; but when a shadowing of what it was burst upon him, he was much agitated. All three were standing round the table. "Am I to understand, Mrs. Grame, that this has been lost--mislaid--all these years?" he inquired. And it was a natural question, seeing the note intact.

"Mislaid!" burst forth Mrs. Grame, giving way to her excitement. "It was stolen, John Ledbitter; stolen from the bag before it went into your charge. And the thief--thief and coward--trembled at his act when he had done it, and dared not use the money. He has kept it since from the light of day. Look at it, Anne."

"And this thief was--"

"Walter Grame. To you I will not screen him, though I am his wretched wife. To the world it may be allowed to appear as was your first thought now--if you, Mr. Ledbitter, will show mercy where none has been shown you. I would not ask it, but for his innocent children. I have not seen him since last night. He is nowhere to be found. Everything is in confusion at home, and the letters this morning had to be sorted by a postman."

"Where is he?" inquired Anne.

"I know not: unless this discovery has so worked upon his fears that he means to abandon his home and his country. I pray that it may be so: I shall be more tranquil without him."

"You are not going? You will surely stay for some refreshment," reiterated Miss Sterling, as Mrs. Grame turned towards the front door, in the same abrupt manner that she had entered it.

"I cannot remain, Anne, I must go back to Higham; and for refreshment, I could not swallow it. A friend of ours drove me over in his gig, and is waiting for me at the gate. You will explain things to my aunt. I have only one more word to say, and that is to you, Mr. Ledbitter. Will you--will you--"

John Ledbitter took her hands in his, looking down compassionately upon her, for her emotion was so great as to impede her utterance, and the corners of her mouth twitched convulsively.

"Will you forgive me?--it is that I want to say," she panted--"forgive my false heart for judging you as others judged? In our last interview--here, in this house--you said if we ever met again it should be under different auspices. The auspices are different."

What he answered, as he led her to the gig, was known to themselves alone. Her tears were flowing fast, and her hand was clasped in his, it may be that in that brief moment a trace of his once passionate tenderness for her was recalled to his heart. Anne Sterling was watching them from the window, but she never asked a question about it, then or afterwards.

It was rare news for Higham. Walter Grame, what with his unfortunate debts and his unfortunate habits, had found himself unable to make head against the storm, and had started off, poor fellow, and taken ship for America: and in the search which followed, his wife had come upon the missing letter and money, amongst some old valueless papers. In what unaccountable manner it could have been mislaid, was useless to inquire now, since old Mr. Grame was dead and gone: but that no fraud was committed by any one was proved by the money being found safe. Probably the old gentleman had inadvertently dropped the letter amidst some papers of his own, instead of into the mail-bag, and never discovered his mistake. So reasoned the town, as they pressed into the post-office curiously to handle the letter and note.

But John Ledbitter? Higham went very red with shame when it remembered him. How on earth could he be recompensed for all he had endured? Three parts of the city, rich and poor, flocked over to Layton in one day: some in carriages, some in gigs, some on horseback, some in vans, and the rest on their two good legs. When Mrs. Sterling saw the arrival of these masses from her bedroom window, she screamed out to Molly and Martha, believing the people must see a fire on the farm, and were coming to put it out. John Ledbitter's hands were nearly shaken off; and many a voice, bold at other times, was not ashamed of its own emotion, as it pleaded for forgiveness and renewed friendship. Everybody was for doing something by way of recompense, had they only known what. Some few were for asking the king to knight him; and John's brothers--who had got on in the world--whispered that the money to set him up, in any farm he chose to fix on in the county, was at his command. John good-humouredly thanked them all; and when the last visitor was got rid of, he turned to Miss Sterling.

"They have been speaking of a recompense," he said to her, in a low tone. "There is only one thing that would seem such to me; and that is not in their power to give. It is in yours, Anne."

Anne's eyes fell beneath his; a rich, conscious colour rose to her cheeks, and there was the same expression on her face that John Ledbitter had never seen but once before, many years ago, ere he had declared his love for Selina Cleeve. He had thought then--in his vanity--that it betrayed a liking for him; and he thought it--not in his vanity--again now.

"Anne," he tenderly whispered, drawing her to him, "that dreadful misfortune, which, when it overwhelmed me, seemed far worse than death, was certainly sent for at least one wise purpose. But for that, I should have linked my fate with your cousin's, and neglected you--most worthy, and long since best-loved. Will you forgive my early blindness--which I have lately wondered at--or will you shrink from sharing that name which has had a brand upon it?"

Closer and closer he held her to him, and she did not resist. No words escaped her lips; but she was inwardly resolving, in her new happiness, a glimpse of which had recently hovered on her spirit, that her love and care should make up to him for the past.

"It is good," said old Molly, nodding her head with satisfaction when she heard the news from her mistress. "We shan't have to give up the farm now, ma'am, for Mr. John can take it upon his own hands."

Mr. John did so; and he took his wife with it.

As to poor Selina Grame, Mrs. Sterling and other relatives made up her income to something comfortable. But when a few months had elapsed, they heard with surprise that she was about to join her husband in America. One and all remonstrated with her.

"Walter wants me," was her answer. "He writes me word that he has put all bad habits away and is as steady now as heart could wish: and he has a good post in an office in New York. One's husband is one's husband, after all, you know."