Joyce sank upon one of the straight-backed chairs, and was just becoming unconscious of all outward things, when the latch-key was fitted into the lock, and Gilbert came in.
With a cry of dismay, he closed the door, and hastened to take her in his arms.
"My darling, what is it? What can have happened?"
He carried her, half fainting, into the dining room, and chafed her cold hands, and held some water to her lips.
A great flood of tears relieved her at last, and then clinging to her husband's neck, and still shuddering in every limb, she managed to tell him the story of Bob Priday's visit.
"It is a very grave matter," Gilbert said; "if the man who is guilty of your father's death is in Bristol, he ought to be apprehended and put on his trial."
"He seems to bear us no ill-will now, Gilbert. He is penitent, I think; and he said dear father fell from the horse, and that he did not actually throw the stone at him. Oh! Gilbert, it seems to bring it all back again."
"Dismiss it from your thoughts to-night, my darling, we shall need all our strength and courage. I am sworn in as a special constable. The people show increasingly signs of ill-will against those in authority. If Wetherall persists in making a public entry into Bristol next week, God only knows what will be the consequences. No one seems to be able to take active measures. The mayor is kindly and well-intentioned, but he has no strength of purpose, and if once the mob gets the upper hand, and those in authority are frightened, there will be a riot such as Bristol has never known. I think, if things do not look more promising, I must send you to Abbot's Leigh with my mother and the babies, and Charlotte Benson had better go home. There is a house at Abbots Leigh, Benson, my partner, will let me have, and you would be out of harm's way there."
"Oh! Gilbert, surely you do not mean that I am to leave you? I could not—I will not leave you!"
"You will do what I think is best and right, like a brave, good wife. You would not add to my anxiety, I am sure. I have seen enough in Bristol to-day to feel certain there will be a desperate struggle before the city quiets down. Only imagine that man, Captain Claxton, being so mad as to call a meeting of sailors on board the two ships now in the harbour, the 'Charles' and the 'Earl of Liverpool,' under pretence of voting a loyal address to the king, but really to get the sailors to form a guard to protect Wetherall when he enters Bristol. Could anything be more likely to enrage the other party? The meeting was broken up and adjourned to the quay, where the anti-reformers passed the resolution in a great uproar, protesting loyalty to the king, but declaring they will not be made a cat's paw of by the corporation and paid agents. The notion of protesting this publicly in the face of all the orders of the mayor! They are going to send a deputation to Wetherall to beg him not to persist in coming in next Saturday; but I am afraid it will be useless. If anything could have added to my own share in the troubles of the city, it is that Maythorne has chosen this time to come to the hotel in Clifton. He is a mere wreck, and so broken down that he looks like an old man instead of in his prime, but he is as bumptious as ever."