To hear his worst anticipations thus put into words was too much for the poor wretch. He fell on his knees, feebly crying for mercy, mercy! “You are a minister of the gospel. Give me this one more chance, sir!” he prayed. “Stop that noise!” growled the curate fiercely, his dark face rendered more rugged by the light and shadow cast by the single candle. “Be silent! do you hear? and get up and speak like a man, if you can. Tell me all—how you came here, and what you came for, and perhaps I may let you escape. But the truth, mind, the truth!” he added truculently. The knave was too thoroughly terrified to think of anything else. “Lord Dynmore dismissed me,” he muttered, his breath coming quickly. “He missed some money in Chicago, and he gave me enough to carry me home, and bade me go to the devil! I landed in Liverpool without a shilling—sir, it is God’s truth—and I remembered the gentleman Lord Dynmore had just put in the living here. I had known him, and he had given me half a sovereign more than once. And I thought I would come to him. So I pawned my clothes, and came on.” “Yes, yes!” exclaimed the curate, leaning forward, with fierce impatience in his tone. “And then?” “Sir?” “Well? When you came here? What happened? Go on, fool!” He could scarcely control himself. “I found a stranger,” whimpered the man—“another Mr. Lindo. He had got in here somehow.” “Well? But there,” added the curate with a sudden change of manner, “how do you know that Lord Dynmore meant to put the clergyman you used to know in here?” “Because I heard him read a letter from his agents about it,” the fellow replied at once. “And from what his lordship said I knew it was his old pal—his old friend, sir, I mean, begging your pardon humbly, sir.” “And when did you learn,” said the curate more quickly, “that the gentleman here was not your Mr. Lindo?” “I heard in the town that he was a young man. And, putting one thing and another together, and keeping a still tongue myself, I thought he would serve me as well as the other, and I called——” “What did you say?” “Not much, sir,” answered the valet, a twinkle of cunning in his eye. “The less said the sooner mended. But he understood, and he promised to give me ten shillings a week.” “To hold your tongue?” “Well, so I took it, sir.” The curate drew a long breath. This was what he had expected. It was to information which might be drawn from this man that his second scheme had referred. And here was the man at his service, bound by a craven fear to do his bidding—bound to tell all he knew. “But why,” Clode asked suspiciously, a thought striking him, “if what you say be true, are you here now—doing this, my man?”