“Well, I should have liked to have taken him home and warmed him a bit,” said the good woman to Lucy; “it is enough to give him the rheumatics for life.  However, he is not the first honest man as has had a drop too much, and taken ’s rest without a feather-bed.  Alack, miss, why, you are all of a tremble!  What ails you? I’m a fool to ask.  Ah! well, you’ll soon be at home, and naught to vex you.  That is right; have a good cry, do.  Ay, ay, ’tis hard to be forced to leave our nest.  But all places are bright where love abides; and there’s honest hearts both here and there, and the same sky above us wherever we wander, and the God of the fatherless above that; and better a peaceful cottage than a palace full of strife.”  And with many such homely sayings the rustic consoled her nursling on their little journey, not quite in vain.

CHAPTER XXVI.

NEXT morning the house was in an uproar.  Servants ran to and fro, and the fish-pond was dragged at Mr. Fountain’s request.  But on these occasions everybody claims a right to speak, and Jane came into the breakfast-room and said:  “If you please, mum, Miss Lucy isn’t in the pond, for she have taken a good part of her clothes, and all her jewels.”

This piece of common sense convinced everybody on the spot except Mrs. Bazalgette.  That lady, if she had decided on “making a hole in the water,” would have sat on the bank first, and clapped on all her jewels, and all her richest dresses, one on the top of another.  Finally, Mr. Bazalgette, who wore a somber air, and had not said a word, requested everybody to mind their own business.  “I have a communication from Lucy,” said he, “and I do not at present disapprove the step she has taken.”

All eyes turned with astonishment toward him, and the next moment all voices opened on him like a pack of hounds.  But he declined to give them any further information.  Between ourselves he had none to give.  The little note Lucy left on his table merely begged him to be under no anxiety, and prayed him to suspend his judgment of her conduct till he should know the whole case.  It was his strong good sense which led him to pretend he was in the whole secret.  By this means he substituted mystery for scandal, and contrived that the girl’s folly might not be irreparable.

At the same time he was deeply indignant with her, and, above all, with her hypocrisy in clinging round him and kissing him the very night she meditated flight from his house.

“I must find the girl out and get her back;” said he, and directly after breakfast he collected his myrmidons and set them to discover her retreat.

The outward frame-work of the holy alliance remained standing, but within it was dissolving fast.  Each of the allies was even now thinking how to find Lucy and make a separate peace.  During the flutter which now subsided, one person had done nothing but eat pigeon-pie.  It was Kenealy, captain of horse.