far is it to Anglebury?” she said.  He told her, and she thanked him, and went away up the line.  In a short time she ran back and took out her purse.  “Don’t on any account say a word in the village or anywhere that I have been here, or a single breath about me—­I’m ashamed ever to have come.”  He promised; she took out two sovereigns.  “Swear it on the Testament in the waiting-room,” she said, “and I’ll pay you these.”  He got the book, took an oath upon it, received the money, and she left him.  He was off duty at half-past five.  He has kept silence all through the intervening time till now, but lately the knowledge he possessed weighed heavily upon his conscience and weak mind.  Yet the nearer came the wedding-day, the more he feared to tell.  The actual marriage filled him with remorse.  He says your sister’s kindness afterwards was like a knife going through his heart.  He thought he had ruined her.’

‘But whatever can be done?  Why didn’t he speak sooner?’ cried Owen.

‘He actually called at my house twice yesterday,’ the rector continued, ’resolved, it seems, to unburden his mind.  I was out both times—­he left no message, and, they say, he looked relieved that his object was defeated.  Then he says he resolved to come to you at the Old House last night—­started, reached the door, and dreaded to knock—­and then went home again.’

‘Here will be a tale for the newsmongers of the county,’ said Owen bitterly.  ’The idea of his not opening his mouth sooner—­the criminality of the thing!’

’Ah, that’s the inconsistency of a weak nature.  But now that it is put to us in this way, how much more probable it seems that she should have escaped than have been burnt—­’

’You will, of course, go straight to Mr. Manston, and ask him what it all means?’ Edward interrupted.

’Of course I shall!  Manston has no right to carry off my sister unless he’s her husband,’ said Owen.  ’I shall go and separate them.’

‘Certainly you will,’ said the rector.

‘Where’s the man?’

‘In his cottage.’

’’Tis no use going to him, either.  I must go off at once and overtake them—­lay the case before Manston, and ask him for additional and certain proofs of his first wife’s death.  An up-train passes soon, I think.’

‘Where have they gone?’ said Edward.

’To Paris—­as far as Southampton this afternoon, to proceed to-morrow morning.’

‘Where in Southampton?’

’I really don’t know—­some hotel.  I only have their Paris address.  But I shall find them by making a few inquiries.’

The rector had in the meantime been taking out his pocket-book, and now opened it at the first page, whereon it was his custom every month to gum a small railway time-table—­cut from the local newspaper.

‘The afternoon express is just gone,’ he said, holding open the page, ’and the next train to Southampton passes at ten minutes to six o’clock.  Now it wants—­let me see—­five-and-forty minutes to that time.  Mr. Graye, my advice is that you come with me to the porter’s cottage, where I will shortly write out the substance of what he has said, and get him to sign it.  You will then have far better grounds for interfering between Mr. and Mrs. Manston than if you went to them with a mere hearsay story.’