"I am glad we are going just now," she whispered back. "That pedlar's eyes haunt me, and they are all desperate men."
These words were sufficient to make Colonel Bingham hurry on his arrangements, so that before three weeks were over he and his whole household were on their way to their new home.
As they got out of the train Colonel Bingham turned to Patty. "You and I will drive to Lady Glendower's, where we shall stay the night."
"Oh, dad, darling dad, don't take me there. Aunt Glendower won't like a hoyden to visit her."
"She will like to welcome a brave girl," answered her father quietly.
But as Patty still shrank away from the thought he added:
"I have told her all that has happened, and she herself wrote asking me to bring you, and I promised I would."
Rose met her with soft, clinging kisses, and then Lady Glendower folded her in an embrace such as Patty had not thought her capable of giving.
"I am proud of my brave niece," she whispered. "Patty, go upstairs with Rose, and get Céline to measure you for your ball-dress. I am going to give another ball next month, and you are to be the heroine."
Under skilful treatment Timothy Smith recovered his usual health, though the injury to his hand and knee made him a cripple for the rest of his life. The trial was another terrible experience for Patty, and Fanny thought she would have died when she saw the prisoners stand forward in the dock to receive sentence. "Five years' penal servitude," said the judge, and Patty sometimes shudders to think that the five years are nearly up.