"Granny's like to die," she had said, "and couldn't or wouldn't rest till she had seen Abe. She had found the ring Abe had given me, and after that nothing would quieten her but seeing Abe. And Daft Billy had brought Abe long after midnight, and Ephraim was there, and there were angry words and foul looks, and Ephraim went off in ugly mood. Then after a long, long time Abe started out, but whether for Pole Moor or Wrigley Mill I didn't know for sure. And after he had gone I couldn't rest for thinking of Ephraim's black looks. Something here," putting her hand over her fluttering heart, "seemed to tell me that danger menaced Abe. I dare not leave the sick woman, or I would myself have braved the darkness and the storm even in that grim hour. So, unable to still the forebodings that beset me, I stole out of the house to the hovel where Daft Billy dwells by his lone. I roused him with difficulty, and told him my fears. As he valued my friendship I bade him follow Abe's footsteps, if he could trace them in the snow, and see Abe, himself unseen, safe bestowed either at Pole Moor or Wrigley Mill." And Billy, who it seemed was in the habit of sleeping in his clothes, as saving trouble and blankets, had snatched up a lanthorn and made off in the dark, whilst Miriam returned to the sick woman's side, to count the minutes, aye, the seconds, till news should come. Then after a never-ending waiting, after the late dawn of day, Billy had returned to Burnplatts, had thrust open her cottage door, and said just this and no more: "Th' young fooil's all reet. There's bin a bit o' a accident, but nowt to scare yo'. He's at th' Pole." And neither coaxing, nor threats, nor cross-examination, nor bribes, nor tears, nor woman's wiles in all their forms and force, could extract another word from Billy, surnamed the Daft, but who, as I think I have said before, was by no means so daft as he was called. And of Ephraim there had been neither sight nor sound since he had left his granddam's cottage on that eventful New Year's morn. But it was whispered at Burnplatts--goodness knows how such things do get bruited abroad--that Abe, the old parson's son, was sick unto death, stabbed to the heart on Stanedge Moor. How he had been conveyed to Pole Moor there were a thousand guesses; but I couldn't tell, and Daft Billy wouldn't. CHAPTER VIII. THE PASSING OF MOTHER SYKES. IT must have been in the third or fourth week of my convalescence. I know I was allowed to get up for a few hours each day and sit by the fireside wrapped in a great shawl, and I kept Ruth busy making beef-tea and mutton-broth and rice puddings and custards. Fortunately, as she said, her hens had settled well down to laying, and eggs were plentiful. Dr. Dean had been very wroth when he heard about the home-brewed. He said it was of an inflammatory nature, and had put me on to barley water, a drink I've had a mortal loathing for ever since.