At last--the way seemed a long one, and the pony, always slow and measured in his movements, appeared more than usually addicted to his besetting sin of taking his own time upon the road--at last the houses of Gawthorpe came in sight, the High-street was gained, and the Bell Inn, a flat-faced red-bricked building of imposing dimensions, rose up before the elderly pair of anxious and troubled visitors, in all the busy dulness of a county town’s best inn. It was long past eight o’clock--a soft sweet summer’s evening--the daylight fading gradually away, and the sounds of active life dying on the ear as the solemn shades of night crept slowly onward. There were but few persons in the street, or crowding (as they had done an hour before) round the entrance of the hotel. For the present, at least, there seemed nothing new to learn concerning the great and absorbing topic of the day--namely, the mysterious “accident” which had happened to Colonel Frederick Norcott. The public--that very curious as well as impertinent many-headed monster--had already begun to put forth certain likely as well as unlikely surmises on the occasion; and in those surmises, had not the owner of Updown Paddocks been the respected John Beacham that he was, he would probably have played a somewhat conspicuous part. There were not a few (their remarks, however, as not likely to be received in good part, were made _sotto voce_) who considered it as a suggestive circumstance that Mr. John Beacham, though the first to give the alarm, had never either to man, woman or child--so far at least as was generally known--mentioned any particulars of the accident; or, which was still more remarkable, seeing that the said John was very far from being of an uncommunicative temperament, had he given utterance to any surmises, any suggestive hints, which might have guided the gossip-lovers to a discovery of the truth. For a long period--a period lengthened into hours through the undisguised curiosity of the neighbourhood--the avenues to the hotel were thronged with persons desirous of learning something “authentic” before their return to the quiet of their respective homes. That there did remain behind something more to learn, everyone seemed instinctively to feel; and the few persevering ones that still lingered round the hotel-doors would probably have felt amply rewarded for their pains could they have stood behind the dingy curtain of the big inn-bed, and overheard a long and whispered converse which the object of their curiosity, pale, excited, and contrary to the orders of Dr. Kempshall, held soon after her arrival with his distressed and agitated mother. In that interview--moved thereto chiefly by an unaccountable desire (the offspring, probably, of a fevered imagination) to see by his bedside the daughter of one whom for a brief season he had passionately loved--Frederick Norcott revealed to his long-enduring parent the sad episode of his life, which, by so