very air Tom had been born and brought up in. He knew there were people in St Ogg's who made a show without money to support it, and he had always heard such people spoken of by his own friends with contempt and reprobation: he had a strong belief, which was a life-long habit, and required no definite evidence to rest on, that his father could spend a great deal of money if he chose; and since his education at Mr Stelling's had given him a more expensive view of life, he had often thought that when he got older he would make a figure in the world, with his horse and dogs and saddle, and other accoutrements of a fine young man, and show himself equal to any of his contemporaries at St Ogg's, who might consider themselves a grade above him in society, because their fathers were professional men or had large oil- mills. As to the prognostics and head-shaking of his aunts and uncles, they had never produced the least effect on him except to make him think that aunts and uncles were disagreeable society: he had heard them find fault in much the same way as along as he could remember. His father knew better than they did.

The down had come on Tom's lip, yet his thoughts and expectations had been hitherto only the reproduction in changed forms of the boyish dreams in which he had lived three years ago. He was awakened now with a violent shock.

Maggie was frightened at Tom's pale, trembling silence. There was something else to tell him - something worse. She threw her arms round him at last, and said, with a half sob,

`O Tom - dear, dear Tom, don't fret too much - try and bear it well.'

Tom turned his cheek passively to meet her entreating kisses, and there gathered a moisture in his eyes, which he just rubbed away with his hand. The action seemed to rouse him, for he shook himself and said, `I shall go home with you Maggie? Didn't my father say I was to go?'

`No, Tom, father didn't wish it,' said Maggie, her anxiety about his feeling helping her to master her agitation: - What would he do when she told him all? `But mother wants you to come - poor mother - she cries so. O Tom, it's very dreadful at home.'

Maggie's lips grew whiter, and she began to tremble almost as Tom had done. The two poor things clung closer to each other - both trembling - the one at an unshapen fear, the other at the image of a terrible certainty. When Maggie spoke, it was hardly above a whisper.

`And ... and ... poor father ... '

Maggie could not utter it. But the suspense was intolerable to Tom. A vague idea of going to prison as a consequence of debt, was the shape his fears had begun to take.

`Where's my father?' he said, impatiently. `Tell me, Maggie.'

`He's at home,' said Maggie, finding it easier to reply to that question. `But,' she added, after a pause, `not himself... . He fell off his horse... . He has known nobody but me ever since... . He seems to have lost his senses... . O, father, father... .'

With these last words Maggie's sobs burst forth with the more violence for the previous struggle against them. Tom felt that pressure of the heart which forbids tears: he had no distinct vision of their troubles as Maggie had, who had been at home: he only felt the crushing weight of what seemed unmitigated misfortune. He tightened his arm almost convulsively round Maggie as she sobbed, but his face looked rigid and tearless - his eyes blank - as if a black curtain of cloud had suddenly fallen on his path.

But Maggie soon checked herself abruptly: a single thought had acted on her like a startling sound.

`We must set out, Tom - we must not stay - father will miss me - we must be at the turnpike at ten to meet the coach.' She said this with hasty decision, rubbing her eyes, and rising to seize her bonnet.