Mrs. Halliburton's Troubles

by Mrs. Henry Wood

So, many, besides Mr. Dare, would have felt inclined to say. Herbert, like his father, was firm in the belief that William Halliburton must have taken the money; that it must have been he who paid the visit to the butcher. What Cyril thought may be best inferred from his actions. A sudden fear had come over him that Sergeant Delves was really going to search out the other cloak. A most inconvenient procedure for Cyril, lest, in the process, the sergeant should search out him. He laid down his knife and fork. He had had quite enough dinner for one day.

"Are you not hungry, Cyril?" asked his mother.

"I had a tremendous lunch," answered Cyril. "I can't eat more now."

He sat at the table until they had finished, feeling that he was being choked with dread. But that a guilty conscience deprives us of free action, he would have left the table and gone about some work he was now eager to do.

He rose when the rest did, looked about for a pair of large scissors, and glided with them up the staircase, his eyes and ears on the alert, lest there should be any watching him. No human being in that house had the slightest knowledge of what Cyril was about to do, or that he was going to do anything; but to Cyril's guilty conscience it seemed that all must be on the look-out.

A candle and scissors in hand he stole up to Herbert's room and locked himself in. Inside a closet within the room hung a dark blue camlet cloak, and Cyril took it from the hook. It had a plaid lining: a lining of the precise pattern and colours that the material of William Halliburton's cloak was composed of. The cloak was of the same full, old-fashioned make; its collar was lined with red, tipped with fur: in short, the one cloak worn on the right side and the other worn on the wrong side, could not have been told apart. This cloak belonged to Herbert Dare; occasionally, though not often, he went out at dusk, wearing it wrong side outermost. It was he, no doubt, whom Sergeant Delves had seen wearing one. He was a little taller than William Halliburton, towering above six feet. What his motive had been in causing a cloak to be lined so that, turned, it should resemble William Halliburton's, or whether the similarity in the lining had been accidental, was only known to Herbert himself.

With trembling fingers, and sharp scissors that were not particular where they cut, Cyril began his task of taking out this plaid lining. That he had worn it to the butcher's, and that he feared it might tell tales of him, were facts only too apparent. Better put it out of the way for ever! Unpicking, cutting, snipping, Cyril tore away at the lining, and at length got it out, the cloak suffering considerable damage in the shape of cuts and rents, and loose threads. Hanging the cloak up again, he twisted the lining together.

He was thus engaged when the handle of the door was briskly turned, as if some one essayed to enter who had not expected to find it fastened. Cyril dashed the lining under the bed, and made a spring to the window. To leap out? surely not: for the fall would have killed him. But he had nearly lost all presence of mind in his perplexity and fear.

Another turn at the handle, and the steps went on their way. Cyril thought he recognized them for the housemaid's, Betsy. He supposed she was going her evening round of the chambers. Gathering the lining under his arm, he halted to think. His hands shook, and his face was white.

What should he do with this tell-tale thing? He could not eat it; he dared not burn it. There was no room, of those which had fires, where he might make sure of being alone: and the smell would alarm the house. What was he to do with it?