Yes, all had gone well.  The body, rescued and safe, was now placed within a house near to the churchyard in which Eve’s mother lay:  there it was to be buried.  And there, the next day, the commonplace event of one among many funerals being over, the four thus linked by fate were brought together, and Adam and Joan again stood face to face.  Heightened by the disguise which in order to avoid detection he was obliged to adopt, the alteration in Adam was so complete that Joan stood aghast before this seeming stranger, while a fresh smart came into Adam’s open wounds as he gazed upon the changed face of the once comely Joan.

A terrible barrier—­such as, until felt, they had never dreaded—­seemed to have sprung up to separate and divide these two.  Involuntarily they shrank at each other’s touch and quailed beneath each other’s gaze, while each turned with a feeling of relief to him and to her who now constituted their individual refuge and support.  Yes, strange as it seemed to Adam and unaccountable to Joan, she clung to Reuben, he to Eve, before whom each could be natural and unrestrained, while between their present selves a great gulf had opened out which naught but time or distance could bridge over.

So Adam went back to his hiding-place, Reuben to his shop, and Joan and Eve to the old home in Knight’s Passage, as much lost amid the crowd of thronged London as if they had already taken refuge in that far-off land which had now become the goal of Adam’s thoughts and keen desires.  Eve, too, fearing some fresh disaster, was equally anxious for their departure, and most of Reuben’s spare time was swallowed up in making the necessary arrangements.  A passage in his name for himself and his wife was secured in a ship about to start.  At the last moment this passage was to be transferred to Adam and Eve, whose marriage would take place a day or two before the vessel sailed.  The transactions on which the successful fulfilment of these various events depended were mostly conducted by Reuben, aided by the counsels of Mr. Osborne and the assistance of Captain Triggs, whose good-fellowship, no longer withheld, made him a valuable coadjutor.

Fortunately, Triggs’s vessel, through some detention of its cargo, had remained in London for an unusually long time, and now, when it did sail, Joan was to take passage in it back to Polperro.

“Awh, Reuben, my dear,” sighed Joan one evening as, Eve having gone to see Adam, the two walked out toward the little spot where Jerrem lay, and as they went discussed Joan’s near departure, “I wish to goodness you’d pack up yer alls and come ’longs to Polperro home with me:  ’t ’ud be ever so much better than stayin’ to this gashly London, where there ain’t a blow o’ air that’s fresh to draw your breath in.”

“Why, nonsense!” said Reuben:  “you wouldn’t have me if I’d come.”

“How not have ’ee?” exclaimed Joan.  “Why, if so be I thought you’d come I’d never stir from where I be until I got the promise of it.”