"The last?" he said. "Aye, it's a bit hard."
It was as if she had suggested a new thought to him of which he could not rid himself at once. He kept looking at her, his eyes wandering over her frail little figure and innocent old face, restlessly.
"But I haven't no fear," she went on, "though we never know what's to come. But you're a strong man, and there's not like to be many more years for me—though I'm so well an' happy."
"You might live a score," he answered in an abstracted way, his eyes still fixed on her.
"Not without you," she returned. "It's you that's life to me—an' strength—an' peace." The innocent tears were in her voice again, and her eyes were bright with them.
He lay down awhile but could not lie still. He got up and came and stood near her and talked and then moved here and there, picking up one thing and another, holding them idly for a few seconds and then setting them aside. At last she was going to bed and came to bid him good-night. He laid his hand on her shoulder caressingly.
"There's never been aught like trouble between us two," he said. "I've been a quiet enough chap, and different somehow—when I've been nigh you. What I've done, I've done for your sake and for the best."
In the morning the Works were closed, the doors of the Bank remained unopened, and the news spread like wildfire from house to house and from street to street and beyond the limits of the town—until before noon it was known through the whole country side that Ffrench had fled and Jem Haworth was a ruined man.
It reached the public ear in the first instance in the ordinary commonplace manner through the individuals who had suddenly descended upon the place to take possession. A great crowd gathered about the closed gates and murmured and stared and anathematized.