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sently he began on his own account. Has your friend any private means?' he asked, casting an ungracious glance at the barrister, and returning at once to his buttered toast.

"Who? Lindo, do you mean?' Jack replied in surprise.

'Yes.'

'Something, I should say. Perhaps a hundred a year. Why?' "Because, if that is all he has,' the lawyer growled, buttering a fresh piece of toast and frowning at it savagely, 'I think that you had better see him and prevent him making a fool of himself. That is all.'

His tone meant more than his words expressed. Kate's eyes sought Jack's in alarm, only to be instantly averted. Though she had the urn before her, she turned red and white, and had to bury her face in her cup to hide her discomposure. Yet she need not have feared. Mr. Bonamy was otherwise engaged, and as for Jack, her embarrassment told him nothing of which he was not already aware. He knew that his service was and must be a thankless and barren service-that to him fell the empty part of the slave in the triumph. Had he not within the last few hourswhen the news that the rector had descended the Big Pit to tend the wounded and comfort the dying first reached the town, and a dozen voices were loud in his praise-had he not seen Kate's face now bright with triumph and now melting with tender anxiety? Had he not felt a bitter pang of jealousy as he listened to his friend's praises? and had he not crushed down the feeling manfully, bravely, heroically, and spoken as loudly, ay, and as cordially after an instant's effort, as the most fervent?

Yes, he had done all this and suffered all this, being one of those who believe that

Loyalty is still the same,

Whether it win or lose the game:

True as the dial to the sun,

Although it be not shone upon.

And he was not going to flinch now. He put no more questions to Mr. Bonamy, but, when breakfast was finished, he got up and went out. It needed not the covert glance which he shot at Kate as he disappeared, to assure her that he was going about her unspoken errand.

Five minutes saw him face to face with the rector on the latter's hearthrug. Or, rather, to be accurate, five minutes saw him staring irate and astonished at his host while Lindo, with

one foot on the fender and his eyes on the fire, seemed very willing to avoid his gaze. 'You have made up your mind to resign!' Jack exclaimed, in accents almost awe-stricken. are joking!'

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But the rector, still looking down, shook his head. 'No, Jack, I am not,' he said slowly. I am in earnest.'

Then may I ask when you came to this extraordinary resolution?' the barrister retorted hotly. And why?'

‘Last night; and because—well, because I thought it right,' was the answer.

'You thought it right?'

Jack's tone was a fine mixture of wonder, contempt, and offence. It made Lindo wince, but it did not shake his resolution. 'Yes,' he said firmly. That is so.'

6

'And that is all you are going to tell me, is it? You put yourself in my hands a few days ago. You took my advice and acted upon it, and now, without a word of explanation, you throw me over! Good heavens! I have no patience with you!' In his indignation Jack began to walk up and down the room. the position the same to-day as yesterday? Tell me that.' 'Well,' the rector began, turning and speaking slowly, the truth is

'Is not

'No!' cried the barrister, interrupting him ruthlessly. "Tell me this first. Is not the position the same to-day as yesterday?'

'It is, but the view I take of it is different,' the young clergyman answered earnestly. 'Let me explain, Smith. When I agreed with you a few days ago that the proper course for me to follow, the course which would most fitly assert my honesty and good faith, was to retain the living in spite of threats and opposition, I had my own interests and my own dignity chiefly in view. I looked upon the question as one solely between Lord Dynmore and myself; and I felt, rightly as I still think, that, as a man falsely accused by another man, I had a right to repel the charge by the only practical means in my power-by maintaining my position and defying him to do his worst.'

He paused.

6 Well,' said Jack drily.

But the rector did not continue at once, and when he did speak it was with evident effort. He first went back to the fire, and stood gazing into it in the old attitude, with his head slightly bowed and his foot on the fender. The posture was one of humility, and so

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far unlike the man, that it struck Jack and touched him strangely. At last Lindo did continue. Well, you see,' he said slowly, that was all right as far as it went. My mistake lay in taking too narrow a view. I thought only of myself and Lord Dynmore, when I should have been thinking of the parish and of-a word I know you are not very fond of the church. I should have remembered that with this accusation hanging over me I could not hope to do much good among my people; and that to many of them I should seem an interloper, a man clinging obstinately to something not his own nor fairly acquired. In a word, I ought to have remembered that for the future I should be useless for good and might, on the other hand, become a stumbling-block and occasion for scandal—both inside the parish and outside. You see what I mean, I am sure.'

'I see,' quoth Jack contemptuously, 'that you need a great many words to make out your case. What I do not think you have considered is the inference which will be drawn from your resignation-you will be taken to have confessed yourself in the wrong.' 'I cannot help that.'

'Will not that be a scandal ? '

'It will, at any rate, be one soon forgotten.'

'Now, I tell you what!' Jack exclaimed, standing still and confronting the other with the air of a man bent on speaking his mind though the heavens should fall. This is just a piece of absurd Quixotism, Lindo. You are a poor man, without means and without influence; and you are going, for the sake of a foolish idea-a mere speculative scruple-to give up an income and a house and a useful sphere of work such as you will never get again! You are going to do that, and go back—to what? To a miserable curacy—don't wince, my friend, for that is what you are going to do-and an income one-fifth of that which you have been spending for the last six months! Now the sole question is, are you quite an idiot?'

I have

'You are pretty plain-spoken,' said the rector, smiling feebly. 'I mean to be!' was Jack's uncompromising retort. asked you, and I want an answer—are you a fool ?'

'I hope not.'

"Then you will give up this fool's notion?' Jack replied viciously. But the rector's only answer was a shake of the head. He did not look round. Had he done so, he would have seen that, though Jack's keen face was flushed with anger and annoyance, his eyes were moist and wore an expression very much at variance with his tone.

He missed that, however; and Jack made one more attempt.

'Look here,' he said bluntly: 'have you considered that if you stop you will find your path a good deal smoothed by last night's work?'

6 No, I have not,' the rector answered stubbornly.

'Well, you will find it so, you may be sure of that! Why, man alive!' Jack continued with vehemence, 'you are going to be the hero of the place for the time. No one will believe anything against you, except perhaps Gregg and a few beasts of his kind. Whereas, if you go now, do you know who will get your berth?' 'No.'

Jack rapped out the name. 'Clode! Clode, and no one else, I will be bound!' he said. And you do not love him.'

The rector had not expected the reply. He started, and, removing his foot from the fender, turned sharply so as to face his friend. 'No,' he said slowly and reluctantly, 'I do not think I do like him. I consider that he has behaved badly, Jack. He has not stood by me as he should have done, or as I would have stood by him had our positions been reversed. I do not think he has called here once since the bazaar, except on business, and then I was out. I had planned, indeed, to see him to-day and ask him what it meant, and, if I found he had come to an adverse opinion in my matter, to give him notice. But now—'

'You will make him a present of the living instead,' Jack said grimly.

'I do not know why he should get it,' the rector answered, with a frown, 'more than any one else.'

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'It is the common report that he will,' Jack retorted. As for that, however

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But why follow him through all the resources of his art? put forth every effort-perhaps against his own better judgment, for a man will do for his friend what he will not do for himself-to persuade the rector to recall his decision. And he failed. He succeeded, indeed, in wringing the young clergyman's heart and making him wince at the thought of his barren future and his curate's triumph; but there his success ended. He made no progress towards inducing him to change his mind; and presently he found that all the arguments he advanced were met by a set formula, to which the rector seemed to cling as in selfdefence.

'It is no good, Jack,' he answered-and if he said it once, he said it half a dozen times-' it is no good! I cannot take any one's

advice on this subject. The responsibility is mine, and I cannot shift it! I must try to do right according to my own conscience!' Jack did not know that the words were Kate's, and that every time the rector repeated them he had Kate in his mind. But he saw that they were unanswerable; and when he had listened to them for the sixth time he took up his hat in a huff. Well, have your own way!' he said, turning away. After all, you are right. It is your business and not mine. Give Clode the living if you like!' And he went out sharply.

CHAPTER XXIII.

THE CURATE HEARS THE NEWS.

SELDOM, if ever, had the curate passed a week so harassing as that which was ushered in by the bazaar, and was destined to endthough he did not know this-in the colliery accident. During these seven days he managed to run through a perfect gamut of feelings. He rose each day in a different mood. One day he was hopeful, confident, assured of success; the next fearful, despondent, inclined to give up all for lost. One day he went about telling himself that the rector would not resign; that he would not himself resign in his place; that people were mad to say he would; that men do not resign livings so easily; that the very circumstances of the case must compel the rector to stand his ground. The next he saw everything in a different light. He appreciated the impossibility of a man attacked on so many sides maintaining his position for any length of time; and counted the rector's cause as lost already. One hour he bitterly regretted that he had cut himself off from his chief; the next he congratulated himself as sincerely on being untrammelled by any but a formal bond. Why, people might even have expected him, had he strongly supported the rector, to refuse the living!

He saw Laura several times during the week, but he did not open to her the extent of his hopes and fears. He shrank from doing so out of a natural prudent reticence; which after all meant only the refraining from putting into words things perfectly understood by both. To some extent he kept up between them the thin veil of appearances, which many who go through life in closest companionship preserve to the end, though each has long ago found it transparent. But though he said nothing, confining the tumult

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