“And yet his soul is sicker than his body,” answered Dick.
“Have ye seen him?” asked Sir Oliver, with a manifest start.
“I do but come from him,” replied Dick.
“What said he? what said he?” snapped the priest, with extraordinary eagerness.
“He but cried for you the more piteously, Sir Oliver. It were well done to go the faster, for his hurt is grievous,” returned the lad.
“I am straight for him,” was the reply. “Well, we have all our sins. We must all come to our latter day, good Richard.”
“Ay, sir; and it were well if we all came fairly,” answered Dick.
The priest dropped his eyes, and with an inaudible benediction hurried on.
“He, too!” thought Dick—“he, that taught me in piety! Nay, then, what a world is this, if all that care for me be blood-guilty of my father’s death? Vengeance! Alas! what a sore fate is mine, if I must be avenged upon my friends!”
The thought put Matcham in his head. He smiled at the remembrance of his strange companion, and then wondered where he was. Ever since they had come together to the doors of the Moat House the younger lad had disappeared, and Dick began to weary for a word with him.