enough of them soon. Mr. Glasscott," she continued, closing the door,
"hear me, while I am able to bear testimony, lest weakness--woman's
weakness--overcome me, and I falter in the truth. In the broom-sellers'
cottage, across the common, on the left side of the chimney, concealed
by a large flat stone, is a hole--a den; there much of the property
taken from Sir Thomas Purcel's last night is concealed."

"I have long suspected these men--Smith, I think, they call themselves.
Yet they are but two. Now, we have abundant proof, that _three_ men
absolutely entered the house."

"There was a third," murmured Grace, almost inaudibly.

"Who?"

"My--my--my husband!" and, as she uttered the word, she leaned against
the chimney-piece for support, and buried her face in her hands.

The clergyman groaned audibly;--he had known Grace from her childhood,
and felt what the declaration must have cost her. Sir Thomas Purcel was
cast in a sterner mould.

"We are put clearly on the track, Mr. Glasscott," he said, "and must
follow it forthwith; yet there is something most repugnant to my
feelings in finding a woman thus herald her husband to destruction."

"It was to save my children from sin!" exclaimed Grace, starting
forward with an energy that appalled them all: "God in heaven, whom
I call to witness, knows, that though I would sooner starve than taste
of the fruits of his wickedness, yet I could not betray the husband of