It was best for all that they should get away from Heritage Hall at once. It was no home for her now, and her father declared he could never look the old squire in the face again.
‘I shall feel like a thief, stealing away in the night,’ he said; ‘but, for Master George’s sake, I must do it. If they got me before the lawyers, and made me speak what I know, it ud hang him.’
‘Father!’
Bess had seized the old lodge-keeper by the arm, and her face was ashy-white.
‘No! no! I don’t mean that, my lass,’ he said, trying to soothe lier. ‘That’s only a manner of speaking, like. Of course there ain’t no murder in it. Squire’ll be all right in a day or two.’
‘And George will be free?’
‘Ay, ay, my lass, o’ course he will; and till then you and I will go up to London, and keep out o’ the way o’ curious folk, as wants to know more o’ their neighbours’ business than is good for ‘em. We’ll go up to London, and bide till we hear news o’ the young master.’
In the silence of the night an old man and a young woman stole out of the gates of Heritage Park.
The old man looked back with lingering glances at the old place which had been home to him for forty years.
He had his little store of money with him, and something that he prized beyond gold—his greatest earthly treasure—his Bess.