“Well, you wouldn’t, of course. He’d been fishing, I fancy, and came along just when it made all the difference. I don’t know what I should have done without him.”
“And Thomas? You are sure that it was Thomas? What became of him?”
“He made off across the fields. It was dark and useless to follow him—we had other things to think of, as you may imagine. Ten to one he has made for Manchester, but Clement will see to that. Oh, we’ll have him! But there, I’ll not tell you any more, Jos. You look ill as it is, and it will only spoil your sleep. Do you go upstairs and lie down, or you will never be able to go on.” And, Miss Peacock fussily seconding his advice, Jos consented and went.
Arthur’s manner had been kind, and Jos thought him kind. A brother could not have been more anxious to spare her unpleasant details. But, told as he had told it, the story left her under the impression that Clement’s part had been secondary only, and slight, and that if there were a person to whom she owed the preservation of her father’s life, it was Arthur, and Arthur only. Which she was the more ready to believe, in view of the masterly way in which he had managed all at the house, had taken the upper hand in all, and saved her, and spared her.
Yet Arthur had been careful to state no facts which could be contradicted by evidence, should the whole come out—at an inquest, for instance. He had foreseen the possibility of that, and had been careful. Indeed, it was with that in his mind that he had—well, that he had not gone into details.
CHAPTER XVI
Clement had walked with the doctor to the door and had secured a last word with Arthur outside, but he had not ventured to enter the house, much less to ask for Josina. He knew how heavily the shock would fall on her, and his heart was wrung for her. But he knew also, or he guessed, that the poignancy of her grief would be sharpened by remorse, and he felt that in the first outburst of self-reproach his presence would be the last she would welcome.
It was not a pleasant thought for a lover; but then how much worse, he reflected, would it have been for her, had she never made up her mind to confession. And in his own person how much better he now stood. He had saved the Squire’s life, and had saved it in circumstances that must do him credit. He had run his risks, and been put to the test, and he had come manfully out of it; and he still felt that elation of spirit, that readiness to do and dare, to meet fresh ventures, which attends on a crisis successfully encountered.
He was not in a mood to be dashed by trifles therefore, or Arthur, when he came out to speak to him, would have dashed him, for Arthur was rather short with him. “You can do nothing here,” he said. “We are tumbling over one another. Get after that rascal. He has got away with four hundred in gold and we must recover it. Watkins at the Griffin may know where he’ll make for.”
“He’s in livery, isn’t he?”