Tom's face, which had brightened as the stranger commenced, became clouded ere the remarks were finished; and, when they terminated, he burst into tears. "O sir!" he sobbed, "have pity on a poor misguided lad, who never meant evil to any one--who is as innocent of the crime of which he is accused as you are. Save me, sir! O save me! if not on my own account, at least on that of my poor mother, who will break her heart if I am condemned." "I would willingly save you if I could," was the rejoinder; "but I cannot influence juries--I cannot sway the Court." "And must I die, then? Must I, before my time, go down to my grave dishonoured and disgraced? O sir! if it had pleased Heaven to visit me with a deadly sickness, I would have left the world without one sigh except for my mother. But to be degraded as a felon--to be branded as a murderer--it is too--too much." He became so agitated that grief choked his utterance. The stranger, obviously affected, look his hand. "Tom, have you firmness? There is a way, perhaps." "How!" exclaimed the lad, eagerly. "This room is only one storey from the ground, and escape is possible." "Escape! No! no! The windows are barred with iron; besides, if I escape, it looks like guilt, and I cannot bear that." "But, will staying behind prove your innocence? Will your suffering the last penalty of the law convince the world that you did not commit the murder?" "True--very true! If I live, my innocence may yet be proved--but how to get through the window." "That can be easily managed, if you will act like a man. It is now early. I will be with you again before the prison shuts. Remember! not one word to your mother. You may console her by saying that your agent--for such I am--has given you hopes. Nothing more. Remember!" So saying, he departed. * * * * * * It was rather late when the stranger, who called himself Mortlake, returned. Tom had kept his promise; and, by affording his mother hopes of an acquittal, contrived to infuse a happiness to which her bosom had been for many a week a stranger.