"Yes, Mr. Archie; very good for such a young hand. He has fifteen shillings a week." "He drinks--depend upon it he drinks spirits, and that's what gives him that hang-dog look," said Archie. "You've never seen him the worse for drink, have you?" asked Mr. Munster, not unwilling to have an excuse for getting rid of the ragged stranger. "Well, I don't know," he answered. "He was leaning up against a wall the other day when I passed, and when he saw me coming he tried to stand upright, and he regularly staggered. I could see it was as much as ever he could do." "H'm!" said Mr. Munster thoughtfully; "I shall watch him, then. If I catch him like that at his work, I shall soon send him packing." "And there's another thing," Archie went on. "What does he do with the things he buys? What do you think I saw him getting last week?" "Couldn't say, sir, I'm sure." "Why, three boys' fur caps, and a lot of serge, and a girl's cloak, and four pairs of cheap stockings, and other things besides. I was in Dutton's shop when he came in. He didn't see me because of a pile of blankets, and I heard him buy all those things, and carry them off. He paid for half, and the rest he said he'd pay for this week. He must have bought things there before, or they wouldn't have trusted him. But, you know, they'd come to very nearly as much as his wages." "Yes; I don't understand it," said Mr. Munster. "But, after all, it isn't our business if he does his duty at the mill." "No, I know," said Archie; "but I believe there's something wrong about him, and I should like to know what it is." "Well, 'give him enough rope and he'll hang himself,' as they say," rejoined Mr. Munster--"that is, if your ideas about him are true." Archie said no more on the subject then, but he made up his mind to keep a sharp look-out upon Stephen's conduct. Whenever he met him, therefore, he looked keenly at him; and he would sometimes come through the great room where Stephen worked, with a number of other men and lads, and stand close to him, silently scrutinizing him. If he spoke to him, it was always to ask a question which obliged young Bennett to say a good deal in reply; and Archie was forced to own that he displayed a considerable knowledge of the branch of business in which he was occupied. But Stephen soon discovered that he was regarded with suspicion, and he came to dread his young master's approach, and the cold, searching glance of his blue eyes. Stephen had looked haggard and careworn from the first, but as weeks passed on he seemed to get worse. He still did his duty as well, or almost as well, as ever, but he grew perceptibly weaker every day, and at last he could hardly drag himself along. "I doubt if I'll last much longer," he said to himself, as he reached the mill one morning about three months after his first arrival at Longcross, "but father's time will be out next week. I must write to him to-day or to-morrow and warn him what may be coming."