"And you can stand there, Mr. Dodd, and tell me this dreadful thing. Oh, Mr. Dodd," she said with withering sarcasm, "I thought just now that I was the wife of a bishop. Alas, I learn from your lips the terrible truth, the truth which my poor father so often impressed upon me, that I am only married to a fool," and she rushed from the room. I suppose that the parson was after all a callous stony-hearted man, for though he breakfasted alone, he devoured the entire dish of stewed kidneys, which the parlour-maid had placed upon the table with a low obeisance. CHAPTER IX. MR. CAPT LEAVES SERVICE. Mr. Capt bided his time. The quiet respectful foreign servant showed by no word or gesture that he held the key to the mystery of Lucius Haggard's birth. His duties were almost a sinecure, and though now he drew his pay from Lucius Haggard, and was, of course, young Mr. Haggard's own man, yet he gave almost as much attention to the comforts of the younger brother. Every afternoon Mr. Capt was in the habit of taking a long walk in the great park. I don't think it was simply for love of exercise, or to admire the scenery, that he was so regular in his pilgrimages to a particular sylvan glade on the border of the river Sweir, which formed the extreme boundary of Lord Pit Town's home park. The real fact was, that Capt was in the habit of making a daily inspection of the place where he had deposited his treasure. At first he was accustomed to walk down to the river and examine the little tuft of moss which he had so carefully planted over the hiding-place furnished him by nature in the beech tree. But he had noticed that he had worn quite a little path just beneath his tiny treasure-house; such carelessness he remembered might betray him; so though he passed the tree every day, he was careful to avoid his first mistake; and as day by day the little tuft of moss grew greener, for it had now evidently taken root, Capt gradually inspected the tree just as carefully but from a greater distance. From many a point of vantage he could observe the little green patch, and at length, by a refinement of ingenuity, he was enabled to keep away from the tree altogether. His eternal cigar in his mouth, he was accustomed to walk about well within sight of the beech tree. The spot was secluded enough when he had first adopted the hiding-place, but as the autumn wore on and the leaves fell, Mr. Capt thanked his stars at his own ingenuity. Having assured himself that no one was in sight, Mr. Capt would take a small opera glass from his pocket, then he would commence by its aid to admire the view, he would gaze round at all points of the compass; last of all, his glance would inevitably fall upon the beech tree, the glass would be fixed steadily upon the little tuft of moss, and then seeing that it was undisturbed it would be replaced in its case, and pocketed with a sigh of satisfaction. And then Mr. Capt would continue his perambulations in a comfortable