‘Mr Rodley must give me until this evening to think over the matter. I am going into Saint Quinians, if possible to see Harry—that is, Mr Symonds, for even Mr Rodley will admit that plighted troths are not to be broken in this abrupt manner. I shall be home before dark.’ ‘Then I will see you on your road,’ said Rodley, ‘as I am going into the town.’ ‘You need not trouble,’ said Bertha. ‘The road is quite familiar to me, and I have no fear of being molested.’ Then, without waiting to hear whether Jasper Rodley objected or not to the arrangement, she left the house. In exactly an hour’s time, she walked into the town. At the old gate she was confronted by rather a pretty girl, who laid a hand gently on her arm, and said: ‘You are Miss West, I believe?’ Bertha replied in the affirmative. ‘You are in an unhappy and terrible position, and you have very little time to spare, I think?’ added the girl. Bertha looked at her wonderingly, for she could not recall ever having seen her before. ‘I mean,’ explained the girl, who observed that Bertha was surprised at this acquaintance on the part of a stranger with her affairs—‘I mean with regard to that man, Jasper Rodley.—Yes, I know all about it; and I want, not only to be your friend, but to see that evil-doing meets with its just reward.’ The girl was poorly dressed; but her accent and mode of expression were those of an educated woman, and, moreover, she had such a thin, sorrow-lined face, that Bertha felt she could trust her. ‘Let me be with you to-day,’ continued the girl, ‘and you may thank me for it some day. I have long wanted to see you, and have waited here for you often. Never mind who I am—that you shall find out later.’ ‘Very well,’ said Bertha, who naturally clung to the friendship of one of her own sex. ‘I am going to see Mr Symonds—my betrothed.’ ‘The gentleman who was obliged to leave Faraday’s Bank, four years ago; yes, I remember,’ said the girl. They crossed the market-place together, and were soon at Harry Symonds’ lodgings. The servant, in reply to Bertha’s inquiries, said that the young man was so far recovered as to be able to sit up, but that the doctor had ordered him to keep perfectly quiet and to be free from all excitement. So Bertha wrote him a note describing all that had taken place, and begging for an immediate answer. In the course of twenty minutes, the servant handed her a piece of paper, on which was scrawled as follows: