“We’ll leave it over till to-morrow. You wouldn’t have a man do what you’ve too much sense to do yourself?” The subtle poison worked slowly, but still it worked. One night, when he had been more than usually harassed because the bank at Keepton where he had opened an account had definitely refused an overdraft on the ground that the security he was able to offer was insufficient, and Inman’s ingenuity had been unequal to the task of raising money in any other direction, Baldwin sat in the kitchen, brooding over his misfortunes, long after the others had gone to bed. He was weighted with care and dreaded the sleepless hours that stretched in front of him. After a while he went out and quietly entered the office. It would not have surprised Inman to know that the duplicate of the key that locked his cupboard was in the master’s bunch; it might not have surprised him, but it would certainly have gratified him, if he could have seen the door unlocked and the whisky bottle produced. Baldwin had only a vague idea of proportions, but he followed his foreman’s example and mixed himself a stiff glass. That night he slept heavily and was untroubled by dreams. Thereafter the two men drank together, not without protest on Inman’s part, and Baldwin soon outdistanced his teacher. Then Inman knew that the game was won. All the village was aware that Baldwin was drinking heavily before the news reached the ears of Keturah and Nancy. Although it had been planned with that object Inman professed great annoyance when he found that the confidence he had reposed in Albert (very sympathetic confidence) had been abused; and his frowning silence when the matter was mentioned in his hearing was sufficient confirmation of the truth of the report. It was Hannah who told Nancy. Her kindly heart had been touched by the message Jagger had brought her; and knowing that Nancy’s condition caused her to stand in special need of a friend in whom she could confide and who could be of service to her in a hundred ways she determined that nothing short of actual prohibition by Inman himself should keep her away. Hannah was a woman of action; a woman for an emergency; and though sharp-spoken, a healer of breaches rather than a maker of them. Inman gave her a keen glance when he found the two together; said “How d’ye do?” in acknowledgement of her nod; and so tacitly recognised the friendship. It was the first real crumb of comfort Nancy had tasted since her marriage. “You know he’s taken to drink, I suppose?” “Who? James?” inquired Nancy, not wholly indifferent to what this might portend. Hannah shook her head. “Nay, I mean Baldwin. It’s all over t’ place ’at he goes to bed drunk night after night.” It was on Nancy’s lips to deny it; but one or two suspicious circumstances she had observed held back the contradiction. “James has never said aught,” she remarked hesitatingly.