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‘He is not keeping her away?’

‘No, no. He is going back–he is not coming to her for some time.’

‘Then what is detaining her–cruel, neglectful maid!’

‘No, no, Thomas; she is– She could not come.’

‘How’s that?’

Somehow the solemnity of these last moments of his gave him inquisitorial power, and the too cold wife could not conceal from him the flight which had taken place from King’s-Hintock that night.

To her amazement, the effect upon him was electrical.

‘What–Betty–a trump after all? Hurrah! She’s her father’s own maid! She’s game! She knew he was her father’s own choice! She vowed that my man should win! Well done, Bet!–haw! haw! Hurrah!’

He had raised himself in bed by starts as he spoke, and now fell back exhausted. He never uttered another word, and died before the dawn. People said there had not been such an ungenteel death in a good county family for years.

* * * * *

Now I will go back to the time of Betty’s riding off on the pillion behind her lover. They left the park by an obscure gate to the east, and presently found themselves in the lonely and solitary length of the old Roman road now called Long-Ash Lane.

By this time they were rather alarmed at their own performance, for they were both young and inexperienced. Hence they proceeded almost in silence till they came to a mean roadside inn which was not yet closed; when Betty, who had held on to him with much misgiving all this while, felt dreadfully unwell, and said she thought she would like to get down.

They accordingly dismounted from the jaded animal that had brought them, and were shown into a small dark parlour, where they stood side by side awkwardly, like the fugitives they were. A light was brought, and when they were left alone Betty threw off the cloak which had enveloped her. No sooner did young Phelipson see her face than he uttered an alarmed exclamation.

‘Why, Lord, Lord, you are sickening for the small-pox!’ he cried.

‘Oh–I forgot!’ faltered Betty. And then she informed him that, on hearing of her husband’s approach the week before, in a desperate attempt to keep him from her side, she had tried to imbibe the infection–an act which till this moment she had supposed to have been ineffectual, imagining her feverishness to be the result of her excitement.

The effect of this discovery upon young Phelipson was overwhelming. Better-seasoned men than he would not have been proof against it, and he was only a little over her own age. ‘And you’ve been holding on to me!’ he said. ‘And suppose you get worse, and we both have it, what shall we do? Won’t you be a fright in a month or two, poor, poor Betty!’

In his horror he attempted to laugh, but the laugh ended in a weakly giggle. She was more woman than girl by this time, and realized his feeling.

‘What–in trying to keep off him, I keep off you?’ she said miserably. ‘Do you hate me because I am going to be ugly and ill?’

‘Oh–no, no!’ he said soothingly. ‘But I–I am thinking if it is quite right for us to do this. You see, dear Betty, if you was not married it would be different. You are not in honour married to him we’ve often said; still you are his by law, and you can’t be mine whilst he’s alive. And with this terrible sickness coming on, perhaps you had better let me take you back, and–climb in at the window again.’

‘Is this your love?’ said Betty reproachfully. ‘Oh, if you was sickening for the plague itself, and going to be as ugly as the Ooser in the church-vestry, I wouldn’t–‘

‘No, no, you mistake, upon my soul!’

But Betty with a swollen heart had rewrapped herself and gone out of the door. The horse was still standing there. She mounted by the help of the upping-stock, and when he had followed her she said, ‘Do not come near me, Charley; but please lead the horse, so that if you’ve not caught anything already you’ll not catch it going back. After all, what keeps off you may keep off him. Now onward.’