"I wonder what the deuce is in this box?" said Mr. Wheatley, holding up the little casket he had received. "I should like very much to open it and see; but I think, after what we have just been talking about, it wouldn't do. I should feel my fingers shake, and you would turn away your head and blush. Yet we could find many a plausible reason. We might wish to save Miss Davenport some unnecessary shock--we might fear that the old man was playing some trick upon her--there might be a loaded pistol, with cunningly-contrived machinery, ready within to shoot the person who opens the box. In short, Sir Richard, was ever act committed, so base and mean, which could not find a pretext to justify it, good and valid in a court of law? Now that old man there is going to judgment, granting himself a poor, miserable sinner, and giving me this box, and thinking that the confession and the reparation are quite sufficient to close the great account and strike a fair balance in the everlasting day-book." We rode on till within a quarter of a mile of the sheriff's house, without meeting any one; but there we saw Mr. Henry Thornton and the worthy magistrate himself riding towards us. "I was coming after you, Sir Richard," said the former, as he rode up. "Mr. Hubbard is at my house waiting for you, and we are sadly afraid, do what we can, the escheat will pass. Robert Thornton has so hedged his father in with one legal technicality and another, that we almost fear good aunt Bab's will will be declared null and void; for the real and personal estate are so mixed up in her devise to you, that it is hardly possible to separate them; and if the will is declared null, even those poor slaves will fall into the hands of others." "They shall be free, notwithstanding," I answered. "Stay, stay, all of you," said Mr. Wheatley. "I have got here upon my saddle-bow, Mr. Thornton, Pandora's box, out of which I hope all the miseries of human life have long ago escaped, leaving nothing but pleasant hope sleeping at the bottom." "What do you mean?" asked Mr. Thornton, almost impatiently. "I do not understand." "Simply," I said, "that Mr. William Thornton is dying--probably dead by this time. When he discovered how near he was to his end, some degree of remorse seemed to seize upon him, and he gave Mr. Wheatley that little case to deliver to our dear Bessy, with an intimation that it would set all right." "Then we had better carry it to _our dear Bessy_ at once," said Mr. Thornton with a gay smile. "From your sweet terms, Sir Richard, and from Bessy's radiant face when I saw her just now, I conclude you are a successful kidnapper, and I don't know whether to wish you joy or to cut your throat; for when you take Bessy Davenport away from amongst us, you deprive our little district of half its sunshine."