"Hullo, Walden!" he said--"Here you are at last! I've been waiting for you ever so long!"
"Have you?" and John, smiling radiantly, threw off his hat, and pushed back his grey-brown curls from his forehead--"I'm sorry! Anything wrong?" Dr. 'Jimmy' shrugged his shoulders.
"Nothing particular. Oliver Leach is dead,--that's all!"
Walden started back. The smile passed from his face, for, remembering the scarcely veiled threats of his parishioners, he began to fear lest they should have taken some unlawful vengeance on the object of their hatred.
"Dead!" he echoed amazedly--"Surely no one--no one has killed him?"
"Not a bit of it!" said Forsyth, complacently--"It just happened!"
"How?"
"Well, it appears that the rascal has been lying low for a considerable time in the house of our reverend friend, Putwood Leveson. That noble soul has been playing 'sanctuary' to him, and no doubt warned him of the very warm feeling with which the villagers of St. Rest regarded him. He has been maturing certain plans, and waiting till an opportunity should arise for him to get away to Riversford, where apparently he intended to take up his future abode, Mordaunt Appleby the brewer having offered him a situation as brewery accountant. The opportunity occurred last night, so I hear. He managed to get off with his luggage in a trap, and duly arrived at the Crown Inn. There he was set upon in the taproom by certain old friends and gambling associates, who accused him of wilfully attempting to injure Miss Vancourt. He denied it. Thereupon they challenged him to drink ten glasses of raw whiskey, one on top of another, to prove his innocence. It was a base and brutal business, but he accepted the challenge. At the eighth glass he fell down unconscious. His companions thought he was merely drunk--but--as it turned out--he was dead." [Footnote: This incident happened lately in a village in the south of England.] Walden heard in silence.
"It's horrible!" he said at last--"Yet--I cannot say sorry! I suppose as a Christian minister I ought to be,--but I'm not! I only hope none of my people were concerned in the matter?"
"You may be quite easy on that score,"--replied Forsyth--"Of course there will be an inquest, and a severe reproof will be administered to the men who challenged him,--but there the affair will end. I really don't think we need grieve ourselves unduly over the exit of one scoundrel from a world already overburdened with his species." With that, he turned and poked the fire into a brighter blaze. "Let us talk of something else"--he said. "I called in to tell you that Santori is in London, and that I have taken the responsibility upon myself of sending for him to see Miss Vancourt."