"
Mrs. Willet promised that the girl should be taken care of, and made
thoroughly comfortable. "Poor young thing," said the landlady, "she
looks dreadfully pale and ill, and I'm sure she'll be none the worse
for a nice little bit of supper. Come with me, my dear."
The girl obeyed; but on the threshold of the hall she turned and spoke
to Sir Oswald.
"I thank you," she said; "I thank you with all my heart and soul for
your goodness. I have never met with such kindness before."
"The world must have been very hard for you, my poor child," he
replied, "if such small kindness touches you so deeply. Come to me to-
morrow morning, and we will talk of your future life. Goodnight!"
"Good night, sir, and God bless you!"
The baronet went slowly and thoughtfully up the broad staircase, on his
way to his rooms.
Sir Oswald Eversleigh passed the night of his sojourn at the 'Star' in
broken slumbers. The events of the preceding day haunted him
perpetually in his sleep, acting themselves over and over again in his
brain. Sometimes he was with his nephew, and the young man was pleading
with him in an agony of selfish terror; sometimes he was standing in
the market-place, with the ghost-like figure of the vagrant ballad-
singer by his side.
When he arose in the morning, Sir Oswald resolved to dismiss all
thought of his nephew. His strange adventure of the previous night had
exercised a very powerful influence upon his mind; and it was upon that
adventure he meditated while he breakfasted.
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