"It will," replied the vicar, "and before long too. I feel firmly persuaded, I can hardly tell you why, that it will not be so very long before this dark cloud shall pass away." "May the Lord grant it!" said Thomas Bradly; and added, "You understand now, sir, exactly how matters lie; and we shall both feel the happier that you know all, for we are sure that we shall always have your sympathy and prayers, and if anything should turn up we shall know where to go for advice; and in the meantime, we must wait and be patient. I can't help feeling with you that, somehow or other, poor Jane's getting near the end of the wood, and will come out into the sunshine afore so very long." CHAPTER EIGHT. TANTALISING. A few days after the disclosure of Jane Bradly's trouble to the vicar, he met her brother Thomas in the evening hurrying away from his house. "Nothing amiss at home, I hope, Thomas?" he inquired. "Nothing amiss, thank you, sir, in my home, but a great deal amiss in somebody else's. There's nearly been an accident this afternoon to a goods train, and it's been owing to Jim Barnes having had too much drink; so they've just paid him off, and sent him about his business." "I'm afraid," said the vicar, "there has been too much cause for such a strong measure. Poor James has been a sad drunken fellow, and it is a wonder they have kept him on so long." "So it is, indeed, sir; for it's risking other people's lives to have such as him about a station. I suppose they have not liked to turn him off before partly because he's got such a lot of little 'uns to feed, and partly because it ain't often as he's plainly the worse for liquor when he's at his work. But when a man's as fond of the drink as Jim Barnes is, it ain't possible for him to keep off it always just when it suits his interests. And then there's another thing which makes chaps like him unfit to be trusted with having to do with the trains--who's to be sure that he ain't so far the worse for drink as to be confused in his head, even when he shows no signs of being regularly tipsy?" "Who, indeed, Thomas? I am very sorry for poor James and his family; but I am sure he is not the man, while he keeps his present habits, to be trusted with work on the line, which requires a steady hand and a cool head." "Well, sir, I hope he'll begin to see that himself. Now's the time to get at him, and so I'm just going down to try what I can do with him. Jim's never been one of my sort, but he's not been one of the worst of the other sort neither. He's a good-natured fellow, and has got a soft heart, and I've never had a spiteful word from him since I've knowed him."