“Oh, for that matter,” said the Colonel, “I insisted upon it; the man seemed to know nothing but from mere hearsay.  He knew nothing about William Hope, the witness, so I told him he must bring the woman; and, to be just to the man, he seemed to think so too, and that she ought to do her own business.”

“She will not come,” said Grace, rather contemptuously.  “He was obliged to say she would, just to put a face upon it.  To-morrow he’ll bring an excuse instead of her.  Then have your detectives about, for he is a villain; and, dear sir, please receive him in the drawing-room; then I will find some way to get a sight of him myself.”

“It shall be done,” said the Colonel.  “I begin to think with you.  At all events, if the lady does not come, I shall hope it is all an imposture or a mistake.”

With this understanding they parted, and waited in anxiety for the morrow, but now their anxiety was checkered with hope.

* * * * *

To-morrow bade fair to be a busy day.  Colonel Clifford, little dreaming the condition to which his son and his guest would be reduced, had invited Jem Davies and the rescuing parties to feast in tents on his own lawn and drink his home-brewed beer, and they were to bring with them such of the rescued miners as might be in a condition to feast and drink copiously.  When he found that neither Hope nor his son could join these festivities, he was very sorry he had named so early a day; but he was so punctilious and precise that he could not make up his mind to change one day for another.  So a great confectioner at Derby who sent out feasts was charged with the affair, and the Colonel’s own kitchen was at his service too.  That was not all.  Bartley was coming to do business.  This had been preceded by a letter which Colonel Clifford, it may be remembered, had offered to show Grace Clifford.  The letter was thus worded: 

“COLONEL CLIFFORD,—­A penitent man begs humbly to approach you, and offer what compensation is in his power.  I desire to pay immediately to Walter Clifford the sum of L20,000 I have so long robbed him of, with five per cent, interest for the use of it.  It has brought me far more than that in money, but money I now find is not happiness.

“The mine in which my friend has so nearly been destroyed—­and his daughter, who now, too late, I find is the only creature in the world I love—­that mine is now odious to me.  I desire by deed to hand it over to Hope and yourself, upon condition that you follow the seams wherever they go, and that you give me such a share of the profits during my lifetime as you think I deserve for my enterprise.  This for my life only, since I shall leave all I have in the world to that dear child, who will now be your daughter, and perhaps never deign again to look upon the erring man who writes these lines.

“I should like, if you please, to retain the farm, or at all events a hundred acres round about the house to turn into orchards and gardens, so that I may have some employment, far from trade and its temptations, for the remainder of my days.”