"Run, pray run for Mr Purley," cried Mrs Glaire. "I'll go," cried Eve, eagerly. "I don't think there is any necessity," said the vicar, quietly. "Can you get some brandy, my man?" he continued, to Banks. "No, stay, I have my flask." He poured out some spirit into the cup, and Richard Glaire drank it at a draught, getting up directly after, and shaking his fist at the men on the wall. "You cowards!" he cried. "I'll be even with you for this." A yell from the wall, followed by another from the crowd, was the response, when Mr Selwood turned to Mrs Glaire. "If you have any influence with him get him inside somewhere, or we shall have a fresh disturbance." "Yes, yes," cried the anxious mother, catching her son's arm. "Come into the counting-house, Dick. Go with him, Eve. Take him in, and I'll speak to the men." "I'm not afraid of the brutal ruffians," cried Richard, shrilly. "I'll not go, I'll--" Here there was a menacing shout from the wall, and a disposition shown by some of the men to leap down; a movement which had such an effect on Richard Glaire that he allowed his cousin to lead him into a building some twenty yards away, the vicar's eyes following them as they went. "I'll speak to the men now," said the little lady. "Banks, you may open the gates; they won't hurt me." "Not they, ma'am," said the sturdy foreman, looking with admiration at the self-contained little body, as, hastily wiping a tear or two from her eyes, she prepared to encounter the workmen. Before the gates could be opened, however, an ambassador in the person of Eve Pelly arrived from Richard. "Not open the gates, child?" exclaimed Mrs Glaire. "No, aunt, dear, Richard says it would not be safe for you and me, now the men are so excited." For a few minutes Mrs Glaire forgot the deference she always rendered to "my son!" and, reading the message in its true light, she exclaimed angrily-- "Eve, child, go and tell my son that there are the strong lock and bolts on the door that his father had placed there after we were besieged by the workmen ten years ago, and he can lock himself in if he is afraid." The Reverend Murray Selwood, who heard all this, drew in his breath with a low hissing noise, as if he were in pain, on seeing the action taken by the fair bearer of Richard Glaire's message. "Aunt, dear," she whispered, clinging to Mrs Glaire, "don't send me back like that--it will hurt poor Dick's feelings." "Go and say what you like, then, child," cried Mrs Glaire, pettishly. "Yes, you are right, Eve: don't say it." "And you will not open the gates, aunt, dear?" "Are you afraid of the men, Eve?" "I, aunt? Oh, no," said the young girl, smiling. "They would not hurt me." "I should just like to see any one among 'em as would," put in Harry, the big hammerman, giving his shirt sleeve a tighter roll, as if preparing to crush an opponent bent on injuring the little maiden. "We should make him sore, shouldn't we, Tom Podmore, lad?"