Robert, standing on the step of a cottage, watched him give his orders, and took vigilant note of their substance. They embodied the inspector’s directions, and the Rector was satisfied. Henslowe was obliged to pass him on his way to another group of houses. At first he affected not to see the Rector, then suddenly Elsmere was conscious that the man’s bloodshot eyes were on him. Such a look! If hate could have killed, Elsmere would have fallen where he stood. Yet the man’s hand mechanically moved to his hat, as though the spell of his wife’s harangue were still potent over his shaking muscles. Robert took no notice whatever of the salutation. He stood calmly watching till Henslowe disappeared into the last house. Then he called one of the agent’s train, heard what was to be done, gave a sharp nod of assent, and turned on his heel. So far so good: the servant had been made to feel, but he wished it had been the master. Oh, those three little emaciated creatures whose eyes he had closed, whose clammy hands he had held to the last!--what reckoning should be asked for their undeserved torments when the Great Account came to be made up? Meanwhile not a sound apparently of all this reached the Squire in the sublime solitude of Murewell. A fortnight had passed. Henslowe had been conquered, the county had rushed to Elsmere’s help, and neither he nor Mrs. Darcy had made a sign. Their life was so abnormal that it was perfectly possible they had heard nothing. Elsmere wondered when they _would_ hear. The Rector’s chief help and support all through had been old Meyrick. The parish doctor had been in bed with rheumatism when the epidemic broke out, and Robert, feeling it a comfort to be rid of him, had thrown the whole business into the hands of Meyrick and his son. This son was nominally his father’s junior partner, but as he was, besides, a young and brilliant M.D. fresh from a great hospital, and his father was just a poor old general practitioner, with the barest qualification and only forty years’ experience to recommend him, it will easily be imagined that the subordination was purely nominal. Indeed young Meyrick was fast ousting his father in all directions, and the neighborhood, which had so far found itself unable either to enter or to quit this mortal scene without old Meyrick’s assistance, was beginning to send notes to the house in Charton High Street, whereon the superscription ‘Dr. _Edward_ Meyrick’ was underlined with ungrateful emphasis. The father took his deposition very quietly. Only on Murewell Hall would he allow no trespassing, and so long as his son left him undisturbed there, he took his effacement in other quarters with perfect meekness.