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Instead of returning home immediately as he ought to have done, Savareen hung about the tavern all day, drinking more than was good for his constitution, and regaling every boon companion he met with an account of the incivility to which he had been subjected at the hands of the bank clerk. Those to whom he told the story thought he attached more importance to the affair than it deserved, and they noticed that the scar on his cheek came out in its most lurid aspect. He dined at the Peacock and afterwards indulged in sundry games of bagatelle and ten-pins; but the stakes consisted merely of beer and cigars, and he did not get rid of more than a few shillings in the course of the afternoon. Between six and seven in the evening his landlady regaled him with a cup of strong tea, after which he seemed none the worse for his afternoon’s relaxations. A few minutes before dusk he mounted his mare and started on his way homeward.

The ominous clouds of the early morning had long since passed over. The sun had shone brightly throughout the afternoon, and had gone down amid a gorgeous blaze of splendour. The moon would not rise till nearly nine, but the evening was delightfully calm and clear, and the horseman’s way home was as straight as an arrow, over one of the best roads in the country.

CHAPTER IV.

GONE.

At precisely eight o’clock in the evening of this identical Monday, July 17th, 1854, old Jonathan Perry sat tranquilly smoking his pipe at the door of the toll-gate two miles north of Millbrook.

The atmosphere was too warm to admit of the wearing of any great display of apparel, and the old man sat hatless and coatless on a sort of settle at the threshold. He was an inveterate old gossip, and was acquainted with the business of everybody in the neighborhood. He knew all about the bargain entered into between Savareen and Squire Harrington, and how it was to be consummated on the following day. Savareen, when riding townwards that morning, had informed him of the ostensible purpose of his journey, and it now suddenly occurred to the old man to wonder why the young farmer had not returned home.

While he sat there pondering, the first stroke of the town bell proclaiming the hour was borne upon his ear. Before the ringing had ceased, he caught the additional sound of a horse’s hoofs rapidly advancing up the road.

“Ah,” said he to himself, “here he comes. I reckon his wife’ll be apt to give him fits for being so late.”

In another moment the horseman drew up before him, but only to exchange a word of greeting, as the gate was thrown wide open, and there was nothing to bar his progress. The venerable gate-keeper had conjectured right. It was Savareen on his black mare.

“Well, Jonathan, a nice evening,” remarked the young farmer.

“Yes, Mr. Savareen–a lovely night. You’ve had a long day of it in town. They’ll be anxious about you at home. Did you find the money all right, as you expected?”

“O, the money was there, right enough, and I’ve got it in my pocket. I had some words with that conceited puppy, Shuttleworth, at the bank. He’s altogether too big for his place, and I can tell you he’ll have the handling of no more money of mine.” And then, for about the twentieth time within the last few hours, he recounted the particulars of his interview with the bank clerk.

The old man expressed his entire concurrence in Savareen’s estimate of Shuttleworth’s conduct. “I have to pay the gate-money into the bank on the first of every month,” he remarked, “and that young feller always acts as if he felt too uppish to touch it. I wonder you didn’t drop into ‘un.”

“O, I wasn’t likely to do that,” was the reply–“but I gave him a bit of my mind, and I told him it ‘ud be a long time afore I darkened the doors of his shop again. And so it will. I’d sooner keep my bit o’ money, when I have any, in the clock-case at home. There’s never any housebreaking hereabouts.”