“A cruel time I’ve had—­more in the river than out of it,” he said.  “I’m bruised and battered and be bad in my breathing parts also along of exposure and the wet.  I dare say I’ve shortened my life a good bit; but all that was nothing when I thought of you, Jenny.  And now I’m terrible afraid you must face the worst.  I’ve made a beginning, I’m sorry to say.”  He drew a parcel from under his arm and laid out afore her the wreck of a water-sodden billycock hat, a rag of a dark-blue flannel shirt and one ginger-coloured sock in a pretty ruinous state.

“What d’you make of these here mournful relics?” he asked.  “Without doubt they once belonged to your Spider, and where I found’em I’m afraid his poor little bones ain’t far off.”

“They be even nearer than you think, William Westaway,” she said.  “In fact, I’ve found’em myself.”

“Found’em!” he gasped out, glazing with his shifty eyes at her and a miz-maze of wonder on his face.

“Found’em—­not in the Dart neither; but at Meldon Quarry.  Nicky is alive and well, and you know it, and you always knew it.  And your day of reckoning be near!”

She paused.  You might have thought she’d expect for her husband to leap out of the cupboard, but he didn’t; he bided close where he was, like a hare in its form; and she knew he would.

Of course Bill Westaway felt a good bit disappointed.  He cussed Spider up hill and down dale and poured a torrent of rude words upon him.

“That know-nought, black swine come back!  And you put him afore the likes of me I You don’t deserve a decent man,” he finished up.  “And the patience and trouble I’ve took, thinking you was worth it!”

“Go!” she said.  “You’re a wicked, bare-faced scamp, and God, He’ll reward you.  You did ought to be driven out of Little Silver by the dogs, and no right-thinking person ever let you over their drexels[1] no more.”

    [1] Drexels = Thresholds

“I’m punished enough,” he told her.  “Good-bye, my silly dear!  A thousand pities you’ve took that little worm back.  You’d have grown very fond of me in time.  I’m worth a wagon-load of such rubbish as him.”

He lit his pipe, cussed a bit more, hoping Spider would front him, and then went away, banging the gate off its hinges very near; and after he was well clear of the premises Nicky bounced out of his cupboard full of brimstone and thunder.

“Lock the door,” he said, “or I’ll be after him and strangle him with these hands!”

“I most feared you’d have blazed out and faced the wretch,” said Jenny—­to please the little man.

“I managed to hold in.  I drew out my knife however; but I put it back again.  I hadn’t got the heart to spoil the night of my home-coming.  His turn ain’t far off.  His thread’s spun.  Nothing short of his death be any good to me—­not now.”

“Us’ll forget the scoundrel till to-morrow, then,” said Mrs. White.