"I am very sorry, Mr. Galton," was his reply, "but the charge against you, as you are doubtless aware, is a most serious one. You will have plenty of opportunities of seeing your wife—subject to the regulations of the the place whither I am about to convey you; but, upon my own responsibility, I dare not, sir, leave you, either alone or together, with her in private. You can say anything you please to her in my presence; but I warn you to be cautious, if you are about to speak with reference to the crime of which you stand accused, since any admission may be used against you at your trial. If you wish, on the other hand, to speak only of domestic matters, a peace-officer should have no ears in such a case, and you may consider me as not being present."

"You are very kind, sir," said Mary humbly.

How stupendous seemed this man's power, who could carry off her husband in an instant, before her very eyes; and how great his mercy since he did not do so, but lent him to her for a few priceless minutes still.

"Bring me our child," whispered Frederick; and Mary ran to fetch him from his cot upstairs.

The little innocent being of a sprightly nature, and always more ready for caress than sleep, stretched out its arms and clung to its father, in a manner that moved Mr. Links himself.

Then came the parting between the husband and wife, which was silent and terrible. Neither knew exactly when they would meet again, but they both knew whenever it was-that it would be in Newgate.

"Remember me to all, dearest, who do not forget me in my trouble; and let Bassanio know, to-morrow-do not tell him, but only give him to understand-that I take great comfort from this book." He touched a Bible lying on the table, in which they had been reading together not an hour before.

"Yes, Frederick." There was not a trace of wonder in her face; to the outward eye-or, in other words, to Mr. Inspector Links-she appeared almost too stupefied with sorrow to understand what was said. But, in reality, like Dionysius' chamber, she was all ear;

she drank in every syllable like precious drops in

drought.

"I have just marked the verse that gives me greatest

comfort."

He spoke these words with great distinctness, and very differently from the inarticulate farewell that followed. There was a cab at the door, with some one inside already; Frederick entered and took his seat by the side of this person. The inspector followed, sitting with his back to the horse, which did not make him ill. He could accommodate himself to most situations in life. The vehicle drove off, watched by Mary-the most miserable woman, perhaps, in all wretched London. Yet she shed no tear; she had something else to do than weep. She went upstairs to Frederick's roomhow unspeakably lonely and deserted it had grown within that minute or two-and opened his Bible, in the place where he had folded down the leaf. It was at the twenty-first chapter of the First Book of Samuel, and there was a slight pencil-mark at the thirteenth verse: "And he changed his behaviour

before them, and feigned himself mad in their hands."

She carefully erased the pencil-mark, and straightened back the leaf. But the words were stereotyped in her

own mind from that time forth-and the meaning of the words.

CHAPTER XIII.

FOREWARNED AND FOREARMED.

SERIOUS trouble has an enormous power of attraction. There are some persons connected to us by blood or marriage, whom we never see except at the funerals of one's common relatives. Nothing short of death brings us together at present, but it is probable that if the suspicion of a great crime fell upon ourselves, it would have the same effect. The second-cousin, or the wife's uncle-as the case may be-would hurry up to the scene of action from Cornwall or the depths of Wales, full of interest for the connexion who had so unexpectedly become a felon in embryo. The same sympathy might not be manifested after conviction, but while the matter was in dubio, even the most distant branches of the family-tree would undoubtedly,