which they themselves would naturally pursue.  Three words on the previous evening had sufficed to rouse the convict’s jealousy.  What he saw to-day confirmed his suspicions.  The gentleman in knickerbockers could be no other than the squire himself, of course.  He was evidently in the habit of visiting Mary Goddard and he did not wish his visits to be observed by the clergyman, who was of course the vicar or rector of the parish.  That proved conclusively in the fugitive’s mind that there was something wrong.  He ground his teeth together and said to himself that it would be worth while to run some risk in order to stop that little game, as he expressed it.  He had, as he himself had confessed to his wife, murdered one man in escaping; a man, he reflected, could only hang once, and if he had not been taken in the streets of London he was not likely to be caught in the high street of Billingsfield, Essex.  It would be a great satisfaction to knock the squire on the head before he went any farther.  Moreover he had found a wonderfully safe retreat in the disused vault at the back of the church.  He discovered loose stones inside the place which he could pile up against the low hole which served for an entrance.  Probably no one knew that there was any entrance at all—­the very existence of the vault was most likely forgotten.  It was not a cheerful place, but Goddard’s nerves were excited to a pitch far beyond the reach of supernatural fears.  Whatever he might be condemned to feel in the future, his conscience troubled him very little in the present.  The vault was comparatively dry and was in every way preferable, as a resting-place for one night, to the interior of a mouldy haystack in the open fields.  He did not dare show himself again at the “Feathers” inn, lest he should be held to do the day’s work he had promised in payment for his night in the barn.  All that morning and afternoon he had lain hidden in the quickset hedge near the park gate, within sight of the cottage, and he had been rewarded.  The food he had taken with him the night before had sufficed him and he had quenched his thirst with rain-water from the ditch.  Having seen that the squire went back towards the Hall, Goddard slunk away to his hiding-place to wait for the night.  He lay down as best he might, and listened for the hours and half-hours as the church clock tolled them out from the lofty tower above.

Mary Goddard had told him to come later than before, and it was after half-past ten when he tapped upon the shutter of the little drawing-room.  All was dark within, and he held his breath as he stood among the wet creepers, listening intently for the sound of his wife’s coming.  Presently the glass window inside was opened.

“Is that you?” asked Mary’s voice in a tremulous whisper.

“Yes,” he answered.  “Let me in.”  Then the shutter was cautiously unfastened and opened a little and in the dim starlight Goddard recognised his wife’s pale face.  Her hand went out to him, with something in it.