Suddenly the visitor found himself surrounded by a band of determined, angry-looking Sussex men. "What does this mean?" he asked sternly. "Do you men know that I am about the Queen's business?" "Aye, we thought as much, and that's about the reason of it all," answered the spokesman of the rustics. "Gie us them papers which we saw thee so busy with in the church instead of minding thy prayers! Gie us them—we see them sticking out of thy pocket, and we means to have them— or it will be the worse for thee!" "Fools!" snarled the man, without quailing before the coming storm, "fools! do you not know that it is a hanging matter to lay a hand on me?" "It's very likely," said the bold rustic; "but it strikes me some one else will be hung, or drownded, before any of us are sent to join the Lewes martyrs." The angry group was now just beside the horse-pond—and each moment it grew more excited and threatening. Suddenly a voice cried— "He's fond of fire, let's see how water suits him!" Thereupon the rustics hustled the hapless apparitor to the edge of the pond; then he found himself lifted from the ground, and the strong arms of his foes swung him to and fro in the air. "One, two, three, in he goes!" cried a raucous voice. A scream of terror was sent forth by the man, and he struggled violently. It was all of no avail. In another moment he was hurled headlong into the slimy waters of the pond! And there he might have been drowned, but for the help that came to him from an unexpected quarter. Susan Jefferay had been in the congregation, and her attention had been arrested by the unwonted spectacle of a stranger in the church. The service was over, and the Vicar had withdrawn into the vestry; Susan awaited him in the church, for he was to accompany her home to the Place. The wonted silence of the Sabbath-day was broken by the angry voices of men, and Susan hurried out of the church to ascertain the cause—a dreadful suspicion arising in her mind. A glance at the tumultuous scene at the pondside revealed to her the catastrophe which was being enacted. Instantly she flew to the vestry where the Vicar was unrobing, and seizing him by the arm, she cried— "Oh, come, Vicar, come this instant, the men are murdering the stranger!" Then she and the Vicar hurried towards the pond. The enraged rustics had thrown a rope over the unhappy apparitor's shoulders, and having secured their victim in a noose, were dragging him to and fro in the water. "Hold, in God's name!" shouted the Vicar. "What madness possesses you, men?" he continued; "are you not ashamed of yourselves? Here, give me the rope," he cried, as he grasped the situation. "Let me help you, Vicar," pleaded Susan, anxious to have some part in the matter. So the two rescuers drew the half-drowned apparitor to land, and Susan, stooping down, undid the rope which was choking the man.