The Doctor summed up.  There was guilt in the heart of one boy at least, but which one there was no evidence at present to show.  That the fact of the snuff-box being found in Howard’s bed had at first sight looked like circumstantial evidence against him could not be denied, but as the links in the chain had been broken in several places, he considered that the whole had fallen to pieces, and he confessed that he did not believe for a moment, from the facts before him, that Howard was guilty.  From his knowledge of Digby he must fully exonerate him from the charge of willfully implicating his friend in the matter, as it seemed evident that he was justified in expressing the suspicions he entertained, considering the circumstances of the case.  For the present the matter must be dismissed, but he could not doubt that light would soon shine through the darkness, and the true facts of the case would yet be known.  He would still urge that if anything should transpire in the knowledge of any one present that it was important he should know, no selfish motive should induce him to remain silent, while at the same time he would deprecate suspicions of each other, and would remind them that as the law judged those to be innocent who were not proved to be guilty, so it must be in this case.  With this the Doctor dismissed the assembly.

* * * * *

So far in our story we have confined ourselves to the characters in whom we are immediately interested, without any reference to their previous history or family connections.  But I must pause here to take a glance into two homesteads, a few days after the events just described.

In the breakfast-room at Ashley House Mr. Morton had laid aside his newspaper, and was reading a letter from Dr. Brier.  It was the second or third time he had read it, and it seemed to disturb him.  Mr. Morton hated to be disturbed in any way.  He was a hard man, who walked straight through the world without hesitating or turning to the right hand or to the left.  He was a strong-minded man—­at least, everybody who got in his way had good reason to think so.  But he had a rather weak-minded wife.  Poor Mrs. Morton was a flimsy woman, without much stamina, mental or bodily.  She stroked her cat, read her novel, lay upon the sofa, or lolled in her carriage, and interested herself in little that was really necessary to a true life.  It was in such an atmosphere as this that Ethel Morton lived and Digby had been reared.

Their mother had died when Ethel was a very little baby, and when the new Mrs. Morton came home the children were old enough to feel that they could not hope to find in her what they had lost in their true mamma.