"As it seems that you have been the means of forcing the rider off its back, if you have not killed him, I think you can do no less than to ride him home to Mr. Brand's stables," said the doctor. "I am sorry that I brought you here for nothing, Doctor. You don't think that I need to go and give myself up, eh?" "I am very _glad_ that you brought me here for nothing, as it appears, instead of for something," answered the doctor. "No, I do not think that you will have occasion to give any thing up, except your bad temper and your propensity for fighting peaceable men along public roads. I wish you a very good day, Mr. Brand!" and stepping into his sulky, he drove away down the road to attend to some one of his limited number of patients; while the carriage containing Robert Brand whirled rapidly home again, followed at a little distance by Dick Compton on Carlton Brand's horse, the fear of being proved a murderer somewhat lifted from his mind; his military pants haunting him a little less than they had done during the former ride; and the bundle which had at one time threatened to prove so damning an evidence against him, hugged up under his left arm. CHAPTER VI. THE RESIDENCE OF DR. POMEROY--NATHAN BLADESDEN AND ELEANOR HILL--A KNEELING WOMAN AND A RIGID QUAKER--THE RUIN THAT A LETTER HAD WROUGHT--A PARTING THAT SEEMED ETERNAL--CARLTON BRAND ALIVE ONCE MORE, AND A GLANCE AT THE FATAL LETTER. It sometimes happens, in this world which fast people consider dull and slow, that events crowd themselves very closely, both as to time and space. Within a very limited section, in a period covering scarcely more than an hour, we have seen a complication of occurrences, affecting many persons, sufficient to occupy many hours in the recital. And yet the storehouses of event and circumstance have not yet been at all closely ransacked; and that June-day has yet much to reveal, affecting some of the persons already introduced, and others who have not yet come into the field of observation. The spot at which the conflict between Carlton Brand and Richard Compton occurred, it will be remembered, was at the intersection of the highway leading down to the Schuylkill at Market Street, by a blind road which ran back southwardly through the wood,--and that the request of the lawyer to Compton that he would open the gate admitting to that blind road, was made by the farmer the occasion of that quarrel and fight which we have seen terminate so singularly.