Soon a morning came that we did not forget in a hurry. While dressing with the window open to the white flowers of the trailing jessamine and the sweet perfume of the roses, blooming in the warm September air, Tod came in, fastening his braces. "I say, Johnny, here's the jolliest lark! The pater----" And what the lark was, I don't know to this day. At that moment the passing-bell tolled out--three times three; its succession of quick strokes following it. The wind blew in our direction from the church, and it sounded almost as though it were in the room. "Who can be dead?" cried Tod, stretching his neck out at the window to listen. "Was any one ill, Jenkins?" he called to the head-gardener, then coming up the path with a barrow; "do you know who that bell's tolling for?" "It's for Mr. Caromel," answered Jenkins. "What?" shouted Tod. "It's tolling for Mr. Caromel, sir. He died in the night." It was a shock to us all. The Squire, pocketing his indignation against madam and the Nave family in general, went over to the farm after breakfast, and saw Miss Gwendolen Nave, who was staying with her sister. They called her Gwinny. "We heard that he was better--going on so well," gasped the Squire. "So he was until a day or two ago," said Miss Gwinny, holding her handkerchief to her eyes. "Very well indeed until then--when it turned to typhus." "Goodness bless me!" cried the Squire, an unpleasant feeling running through him. "Typhus!" "Yes, I am sorry to say." "Is it safe to be here? Safe for you all?" "Of course it is a risk. We try not to be afraid, and have sent as many out of the house as we could. I and the old servant Grizzel alone remain with Mrs. Caromel. The baby has gone to papa's." "Dear me, dear me! I was intending to ask to look at poor Nash; we have known each other always, you see. But, perhaps it would not be prudent." "It would be very imprudent, Mr. Todhetley. The sickness was of the worst type; it might involve not only your own death, but that of others to whom you might in turn carry it. You have a wife and children, sir." "Yes, yes, quite right," rejoined the Squire. "Poor Nash! How is--your sister?" He would not, even at that trying moment for them, call her Mrs. Caromel. "Oh, she is very ill; shocked and grieved almost to death. For all we know, she has taken the fever and may follow her husband; she attended upon him to the last. I hope that woman, who came here to disturb the peace of a happy family, that Charlotte Tinkle, will reap the fruit of what she has sown, for it is all owing to her." "People do mostly reap the fruit of their own actions, whether they are good or bad," observed the Squire to this, as he got up to leave. But he would not add what he thought--that it was another Charlotte who ought to reap what she had sown. And who appeared to be doing it. "Did the poor fellow suffer much?"