When he left the house, Haworth sprang into his gig with an oath. Since the morning he had had time to think over things slowly. He had worked himself up into a desperate, headlong mood. His blood burned in his veins, his pulses throbbed. He went home to his dinner, but ate nothing. He drank heavily, and sat at the table wearing such a look that his mother was stricken with wonder.
"I'm out o' humor, old lady," he said to her. "Stick to your dinner, and don't mind me. A chap with a place like mine on his mind can't always be up to the mark."
"If you ain't ill, Jem," she said, "it don't matter your not talkin'. You mustn't think o' me, my dear! I'm used to havin' lived alone so long."
After dinner he went out again, but before he left the room he went to her and kissed her.
"There's nowt wrong wi' me," he said. "You've no need to trouble yourself about that. I'm right enow, never fear."
"There's nothin' else could trouble me," she said, "nothin', so long as you're well an' happy."
"There's nowt to go agen me bein' happy," he said, a little grimly. "Not yet, as I know on. I don't let things go agen me easy."
About half an hour later, he stood in the road before his partner's house. The night was warm, and the windows of the drawing-room were thrown open. He stood and looked up at them for a minute and then spoke aloud.
"Aye," he said, "he's there, by George!"
He could see inside plainly, and the things he saw best were Rachel Ffrench and Murdoch. Ffrench himself sat
