Cashel Byron's Profession

"Go," said Lydia, with uncontrollable disgust. "And do not let me

see which way you go. How dare you come to me?"

The sponge-marks on Cashel's face grew whiter, and he began, to pant

heavily again. "Very well," he said. "I'll go. There isn't a boy in

your stables that would give me up like that."

As he spoke, he opened the door; but he involuntarily shut it again

immediately. Lydia looked through the window, and saw a crowd of

men, police and others, hurrying along the elm vista. Cashel cast a

glance round, half piteous, half desperate, like a hunted animal.

Lydia could not resist it. "Quick!" she cried, opening one of the

inner doors. "Go in there, and keep quiet--if you can." And, as he

sulkily hesitated a moment, she stamped vehemently. He slunk in

submissively. She shut the door and resumed her place at the

writing-table, her heart beating with a kind of excitement she had

not felt since, in her early childhood, she had kept guilty secrets

from her nurse.

There was a tramping without, and a sound of voices. Then two

peremptory raps at the door.

"Come in," said Lydia, more composedly than she was aware of. The

permission was not waited for. Before she ceased speaking a

policeman opened the door and looked quickly round the room. He

seemed rather taken aback by what he saw, and finally touched his

helmet to signify respect for Lydia. He was about to speak, when

Phoebe, flushed with running, pushed past him, put her hand on the

door, and pertly asked what he wanted.

"Come away from the door, Phoebe," said Lydia. "Wait here with me

until I give you leave to go," she added, as the girl moved towards

the inner door. "Now," she said, turning courteously to the

policeman, "what is the matter?"

"I ask your pardon, mum," said the constable, agreeably. "Did you

happen to see any one pass hereabouts lately?"

"Do you mean a man only partly dressed, and carrying a black coat?"

said Lydia.

"That's him, miss," said the policeman, greatly interested." Which

way did he go?"

"I will show you where I saw him," said Lydia, quietly rising and

going with the man to the door, outside which she found a crowd of

rustics, and five policemen, having in custody two men, one of whom

was Mellish (without a coat), and the other a hook-nosed man, whose

like Lydia had seen often on race-courses. She pointed out the glade

across which she had seen Cashel run, and felt as if the guilt of

the deception she was practising was wrenching some fibre in her

heart from its natural order. But she spoke with apparent

self-possession, and no shade of suspicion fell on the minds of the

police.