‘Mr. Thornton!’ said Margaret, again.

’I met him this morning, just as he was coming out of this house, and, as he’s an old friend of mine, besides being the magistrate who saw Leonards last night, I made bold to tell him of my difficulty.’

Margaret sighed deeply.  She did not want to hear any more; she was afraid alike of what she had heard, and of what she might hear.  She wished that the man would go.  She forced herself to speak.

’Thank you for calling.  It is very late.  I dare say it is past ten o’clock.  Oh! here is the note!’ she continued, suddenly interpreting the meaning of the hand held out to receive it.  He was putting it up, when she said, ’I think it is a cramped, dazzling sort of writing.  I could not read it; will you just read it to me?’

He read it aloud to her.

‘Thank you.  You told Mr. Thornton that I was not there?’

’Oh, of course, ma’am.  I’m sorry now that I acted upon information, which seems to have been so erroneous.  At first the young man was so positive; and now he says that he doubted all along, and hopes that his mistake won’t have occasioned you such annoyance as to lose their shop your custom.  Good night, ma’am.’

‘Good night.’  She rang the bell for Dixon to show him out.  As Dixon returned up the passage Margaret passed her swiftly.

‘It is all right!’ said she, without looking at Dixon; and before the woman could follow her with further questions she had sped up-stairs, and entered her bed-chamber, and bolted her door.

She threw herself, dressed as she was, upon her bed.  She was too much exhausted to think.  Half an hour or more elapsed before the cramped nature of her position, and the chilliness, supervening upon great fatigue, had the power to rouse her numbed faculties.  Then she began to recall, to combine, to wonder.  The first idea that presented itself to her was, that all this sickening alarm on Frederick’s behalf was over; that the strain was past.  The next was a wish to remember every word of the Inspector’s which related to Mr. Thornton.  When had he seen him?  What had he said?  What had Mr. Thornton done?  What were the exact words of his note?  And until she could recollect, even to the placing or omitting an article, the very expressions which he had used in the note, her mind refused to go on with its progress.  But the next conviction she came to was clear enough;—­Mr. Thornton had seen her close to Outwood station on the fatal Thursday night, and had been told of her denial that she was there.  She stood as a liar in his eyes.  She was a liar.  But she had no thought of penitence before God; nothing but chaos and night surrounded the one lurid fact that, in Mr. Thornton’s eyes, she was degraded.  She cared not to think, even to herself, of how much of excuse she might plead.  That had nothing to do with Mr. Thornton; she never dreamed that he, or any one else, could find cause for suspicion in what was so natural as her accompanying her brother; but what was really false and wrong was known to him, and he had a right to judge her.  ‘Oh, Frederick!  Frederick!’ she cried, ‘what have I not sacrificed for you!’ Even when she fell asleep her thoughts were compelled to travel the same circle, only with exaggerated and monstrous circumstances of pain.