"Glad to see you, Mr. Brancker," he said, heartily. "Hope you are getting on all right in your new berth and that the work is to your liking. I suppose you have come down to spend the week-end with your people."

"I've come down for good, Mr. Edward. I'm not going back," answered John, gravely.

"Not going back!" echoed Edward, surprised, and it may be, a little dismayed. "I was certainly under the impression that you were settled with my friend Lucas for years to come, if not for life. But how has it come about? What has happened to hinder you from going back?"

It was merely the old story over again that John had to tell. For a week or more all had gone well with him. He liked his work and he liked his fellow clerks, but presently the fact oozed out somehow that John was the man who had so recently stood his trial for what was known as "the Ashdown murder," and from that moment his fate was sealed. First one and then another of the staff declined to associate with him, or to have anything to do with him beyond what was absolutely necessitated by the exigencies of business; in point of fact, poor John was completely boycotted.

"I couldn't stand another month of it, Mr. Edward; it would kill me," he said in conclusion in a quavering voice. "It seems no use trying any more. I must either stay where I am, in the hope of being able to live down the prejudice against me, or else go right away to the other side of the world. There appears to be no other choice left me."

[CHAPTER XXV.]

EPHRAIM JUDD'S REMORSE.

Ephraim Judd's breakdown and collapse on that memorable Sunday morning was attributed by everyone there, except the unhappy young man himself, to a sudden attack of illness, and many were the inquiries at his mother's house later in the day by sympathizing Templetonians, who were afraid lest his unaccountable seizure might result in something still more serious. But Ephraim arose next morning and set out for the Bank at his usual time, to outward seeming as well as ever he had been, but with an inner consciousness pervading every fibre of his being, that never again would he be the same man that yesterday morning had seen him. The "gift" on which he had secretly prided himself more than on aught else life held for him, had been recalled without a moment's warning. The fountain of living water had been suddenly dried up within him. Now that by his own act he had rendered himself no longer worthy to preach the "Word" to others, the power of doing so had been withheld from him. He knew as well as if a thousand voices had dinned the fact into his ears, although others knew it not, that he stood condemned at the bar of his own conscience, as one who had wandered from the right path, for whom there was no return possible, save through the narrow gateway of confession and full acknowledgment of his grievous fault. His despair, although unseen of anyone, was none the less profound and abiding.

That winter was a long and inclement one. About the middle of March, Ephraim caught a severe cold, which he would probably have got rid of in the course of a few days--as he had of many previous colds--had he but taken ordinary care of himself. As it fell out, however, he neglected to do so, being at the time in one of those moods in which whether one lives or dies seems a matter of equal indifference. His cold became worse, and presently developed into an acute attack of pneumonia. Then, without saying a word to her son, Mrs. Judd sent for Dr. Hazeldine.

Ephraim's face flushed suddenly, and then as suddenly paled, when Clement was ushered into his room. A very brief examination sufficed to convince the young surgeon that his patient was in a somewhat critical condition. Ephraim's chest had always been delicate, besides which, at the best of times, his general health had never been robust; so that it now became a question whether his constitution would not succumb to an attack from which a stronger man would have rallied without much difficulty. There was one point in his favor; he had two capital nurses in Mrs. Judd and her daughter Eliza, the latter of whom chanced just then to be at home, while looking out for another situation.