CHAPTER VII.

He was gone. They heard the clatter of his horse's hoofs down the road, and listened as it died away.

Neither spoke. Mrs Tresize stood by the table, and so that, glancing sideways across her left shoulder, her eyes studied the doctor's back, which he kept obstinately turned upon her. He had put up a hand to the chimney-shelf and leaned forward with his gaze bent on the embers.

'Doctor?'

'Ma'am?' after a long pause.

'Do you really reckon smuggling so very sinful?'

'It is not a question of smuggling, ma'am.'

'Oh, yes, it is!' she insisted. 'Once you get mixed up in that business you have to deceive at times—if 'tis only to protect others.'

'I can understand, ma'am,' said the doctor, after another pause, 'that to dabble in smuggling is to court many awkward situations. You need not remind me of that, who am fresh from misleading that young man. It was—if you will pardon my saying so—by reason of his trust in my good faith that you escaped cross-questioning.'

'I'll grant that, and with all my heart. But, since deceiving him goes so hard against the grain with you, he shall know the truth to-morrow, when he comes to apologise. Will that content you?'

'It will be some atonement, ma'am. As for contenting me—'

'You mean that I have given you a shock? And that to recover your esteem will not be easy?'

She asked it with a small, pathetic sigh, and took a step towards the fireplace, as if to entreat his pardon. But before he could be aware of this his attention was claimed by a sound without. The latch of the back door was lifted with a click, and, almost before he could face about, steps were heard in the passage. The door of the best kitchen opened a foot or so, and through the aperture was thrust the head of Tryphena—of Tryphena, who by rights should be lying upstairs, victim of a colic.

'Missus!' announced Tryphena, in a hoarse whisper. 'The kegs be stowed all right in the orchet—all the four dozen. But here's Butcher Truman, teasy as fire. Says he's been robbed o' fifty pounds on the way an' can't pay the carriers! An' the carriers be tappin' the stuff an' drinkin' what's left, an' neither to hold nor to bind but threat'nin' to cut the inside of en out—an' he's here, if you plaze, to know if so be you could lend a few pounds to satisfy 'em. I told en—'

'Show him in,' commanded Mrs Tresize, with a creditable hold on her voice; for, to tell the truth, she was half hysterical.

Tryphena withdrew, and pushed the strangest of figures through the doorway. Butcher Truman had discarded the shawl from his head and shoulders, or perchance it had been snatched away by the infuriated carriers. For expedition, too, he had caught up his feminine skirt and petticoat and twisted them and caught them about his waist with a leathern belt, over which they hung in careless indecorous festoons, draping a pair of corduroy breeches. But he still wore a woman's bodice, though half the buttons were burst; and a sun-bonnet, with strings still knotted about his throat, dangled at the back of his shoulders like a hood. He was a full-blooded man, slightly obese, with a villainous pair of eyes that blinked in the sudden lamp-light. He was dangerous, too, between anger and terror. But Mrs Tresize gave him no time.

'Ah, good-evening, Mr Truman! There has been some mistake, I hear; but it's by the greatest good luck you came to me. Here is your missing property, eh?' She smiled and held out the bag.

Butcher Truman stared at it. 'Send I may never—' he began; and with that his gaze, travelling past the bag, fell on Doctor Unonius. 'You?' he stuttered, clenching his thick fists. 'You? . . . Oh, by—, let me get at 'im!'

But Mrs Tresize very deftly stepped in front of him as he came on menacing.

'If you are not a fool,' she said sharply, 'you will waste no time, but hurry along and pay the carriers. They, for their part, won't waste any time with neat brandy. In ten minutes or so they'll be wanting your blood in a bottle—and, if it's all the same to you, Mr Truman, I'd rather they didn't start hunting you through these premises. What's more,' she added, as he hesitated, 'the riding-officer was close on your track just now. You owe it to Doctor Unonius here, that he has overrun it.'

The butcher clutched at his bag, and made as if to open it.

'You needn't trouble,' Mrs Tresize assured him sweetly. 'Your money's good—and so will be mine when it comes to settling, for all that I'm reported "near." Good-night!'

'Good-night!' growled Butcher Truman, and lurched forth with his bag.
The widow, staring after him, broke into a laugh.

'Tryphena,' she said, 'fetch the doctor's horse and harness him quick! We must get him out of this, good man. Are the tubs stowed?'

'All of 'em, missus. I counted the four dozen.'

'Four dozen is forty-eight; and that doctor'—she turned to him— 'is not my age, by a very long way.'

But when Dapple had been harnessed, and the doctor drove off (after looking at his watch and finding that it indicated ten minutes to four), Mrs Tresize lingered at the back door a moment before ordering Tryphena to shut and bolt it.

'There was nothing else to do but lie,' she said to herself, meditatively. 'But, all the same, it's lost him for me.'