To the great horror of Mr. Buffum, his establishment was thoroughly inspected and ransacked, and, as one after another left the hill for his home, he went with indignation and shame in his heart, and curses on his lips.  Even if Benedict and his innocent boy had been murdered, murder was not the only foul deed that had been committed on the hill.  The poor-house itself was an embodied crime against humanity and against Christianity, for which the town of Sevenoaks at large was responsible, though it had been covered from their sight by Mr. Belcher and the keeper.  It would have taken but a spark to kindle a conflagration.  Such was the excitement that only a leader was needed to bring the tumult of a violent mob around the heads of the proprietor and his protege.

Mr. Belcher was not a fool, and he detected, as he sat in his wagon talking with Buffum in a low tone, the change that had come over the excited groups around him.  They looked at him as they talked, with a serious scrutiny to which he was unused.  They no more addressed him with suggestions and inquiries.  They shunned his neighborhood, and silently went off down the hill.  He knew, as well as if they had been spoken, that there were not only suspicions against him, but indignation over the state of things that had been discovered in the establishment, for whose keeper he had voluntarily become responsible.  Notwithstanding all his efforts to assist them in their search, he knew that in their hearts they charged him with Benedict’s disappearance.  At last he bade Buffum good-night, and went down the hill to his home.

He had no badinage for Phipps during that drive, and no pleasant reveries in his library during that evening, for all the possibilities of the future passed through his mind in dark review.  If Benedict had been murdered, who could have any interest in his death but himself?  If he had died from exposure, his secrets would be safe, but the charge of his death would be brought to his door, as Miss Butterworth had already brought the responsibility for his insanity there.  If he had got away alive, and should recover, or if his boy should get into hands that would ultimately claim for him his rights, then his prosperity would be interfered with.  He did not wish to acknowledge to himself that he desired the poor man’s death, but he was aware that in his death he found the most hopeful vision of the night.  Angry with the public feeling that accused him of a crime of which he was not guilty, and guilty of a crime of which definitely the public knew little or nothing, there was no man in Sevenoaks so unhappy as he.  He loved power and popularity.  He had been happy in the thought that he controlled the town, and for the moment, at least, he knew the town had slipped disloyally out of his hands.

An impromptu meeting of citizens was held that evening, at which Mr. Belcher did not assist.  The clergymen were all present, and there seemed to be a general understanding that they had been ruled long enough in the interest and by the will of a single man.  A subscription was raised for a large amount, and the sum offered to any one who would discover the fugitives.