"Assured of your devotion and secrecy, I commit my own honor, and that of my son, to your charge. Time will not permit me to see you, or I would not write. But I place myself entirely in your hands. You will not dare to betray my confidence. To the point:—A Major Mowbray has just arrived here with intelligence that the body of Susan Bradley—you will know to whom I allude—has been removed from our family vault by a Romish priest and his assistants. How it came there, or why it has been removed, I know not; it is not my present purpose to inquire. Suffice it, that it now lies in a vault beneath the ruins of Davenham Priory. My son, Sir Ranulph, who has lent a credulous ear to the artful tales of the impostor who calls this woman mother, is at present engaged in arming certain of the household, and of the tenantry, to seize upon and bring away this body, as resistance is apprehended from a horde of gipsies who infest the ruins. Now, mark me. That body must not be found! Be it your business to prevent its discovery. Take the fleetest horse you can procure; spare neither whip nor spur. Haste to the priory; procure by any means, and at any expense, the assistance of the gipsies. Find out the body; conceal it, destroy it—do what you will, so my son find it not. Fear not his resentment; I will bear you harmless of the consequences with him. You will act upon my responsibility. I pledge my honor for your safety. Use all despatch, and calculate upon due requital from
"Maud Rookwood.
"Haste, and God speed you!"
"God speed you!" echoed Dick, in his own voice, contemptuously. "The devil drive you! would have been a fitter postscript. And it was upon this precious errand you came, Mr. Coates?"
"Precisely," replied the attorney; "but I find the premises preoccupied. Fast as I have ridden, you are here before me."
"And what do you now propose to do?" asked Turpin.
"Bargain with you for the body," replied Coates, in an insinuating tone.
"With me!" said Dick; "do you take me for a resurrection cove; for a dealer in dead stock, eh! sirrah?"
"I take you for one sufficiently alive, in a general way, to his own interests," returned Coates. "These gentlemen may not, perhaps, be quite so scrupulous, when they hear my proposals."
"Be silent, sir," interrupted Turpin. "Hist! I hear the tramp of horses' hoofs without. Hark! that shout."