‘But you do not know--my fears, my suspicions, my distractions. I will not, for all the world, that mine Uncle and he be brought together--nor so much as learn, each one, that the other is in the house.’ ‘No need to, if he is dying.’ ‘He may not die, if at all, until after we are gone.’ ‘H’mph!’ It was a problem, in truth, of which, on profound consideration, there appeared only one solution. Nol and Phineas and William and Mrs Harlock must be taken into one confidence on the subject, and form a conspiracy to keep the fact of the stranger’s presence in the house a secret equally from their lord and from the whole world. If the man survived, he was to be packed quietly away on his recovery; if he died, then the authorities must be informed, the plain explanation being that the body was that of a poor stranger whom the young master had found injured by the way, and had of his pity brought home to tend. Nobody knew who he was or whence come, so nobody could say. So Clerivault took it upon himself to inform and instruct the household, and so it was settled. As to any risk of search at this date, it was considered negligible. If the neighbourhood _had_ been aroused, it had shown no disposition to suspect the Grange of harbouring the fugitive. Some vague rumours of the Teignmouth affair had come Clerivault’s way, but it did not appear from them how far the pursuit had been pressed, or whether, even, it had been of that determined character which perhaps the fears of the victim had magnified. In all probability the whole affair was by now completely forgotten. Brion, to be sure, had no liking for the arrangement; but he was in a desperate quandary, and, short of an inhumanity impossible to him, could see no other way out of it. And then the summons to the voyage came; and that clinched the matter. On the evening of the day when he received it, he went to visit his patient, and to impress upon him the necessity for his instant removal to the house. Somewhat to his astonishment and displeasure, he encountered an opposition where he had the least expected one. ‘You would rather remain where you are, Master Melton?’ said he, haughtily surprised. ‘Then give me leave to tell you that you will remain to perish, since, I being gone, none other could be found to approach within a score yards of this thicket under which you lie buried.’ ‘Sir, my beneficent saviour,’ answered the other, with a low-voiced, measured humility: ‘may it never be yours to suffer the hounding of malignant foes, or, having escaped, broken and demoralised, from their violence, be urged to tempt the Providence which has found you a secure retreat by leaving it untimely for another.’ ‘Untimely!’ cried Brion with impatience. ‘I tell you, man, I quit here to-morrow: I shall be absent for many months. What would you do?’