forget their dangers, sleep through their durance. So that even Adam could not always hold out against a solace which helped to shorten the frightful monotony of those weary days, dragged out for the most time in solitude and darkness. With no occupation, no resources, no companion, ever dwelling on self and viewing each action, past and present, by the light of an exaggerated (often a distorted) vision, Adam grew irritable, morose, suspicious.

Why hadn't Joan come? Surely there couldn't be anything to keep Eve away? And if so, might they not send a letter, a message or some token to show him that he was still in their thoughts? In vain did Mrs. Tucker urge the necessity of a caution hitherto unknown: in vain did she repeat the stories brought of footsteps dogged, and houses watched so that their inmates dare not run the smallest risk for fear of its leading to detection. Adam turned a deaf ear to all she said, sinking at last down to the conclusion that he could endure such suspense no longer, and, come what might, must the next day steal back home and satisfy himself how things were going on. The only concession to her better judgment which Mrs. Tucker could gain was his promise to wait until she had been in to Polperro to reconnoitre; for though, from having seen a party of soldiers pass that morning, they knew some of the troop had left, it was impossible to say how many remained behind nor whether they had received fresh strength from the opposite direction.

"I sha'n't give no more o' they than I sees the wisdom of," reflected Mrs. Tucker as, primed with questions to ask Joan and messages to give to Eve, she securely fastened the doors preparatory to her departure. "If I was to tell up such talk to Eve her'd be piping off here next minit or else sendin' back a pack o' silly speeches that 'ud make Adam mazed to go to she. 'Tis wonderful how took up he is with a maid he knows so little of. But there! 'tis the same with all the men, I b'lieve—tickle their eye and good-bye to their judgment." And giving the outer gate a shake to assure herself that it could not be opened without a preparatory warning to those within, Mrs. Tucker turned away and out into the road.

A natural tendency to be engrossed by personal interests, together with a life of narrowed circumstances, had somewhat blunted the acuteness of Mrs. Tucker's impressionable sensibilities, yet she could not but be struck at the change these last two weeks had wrought in the aspect of the place. The houses, wont to stand open so that friendly greetings might be exchanged, were now closed and shut; the blinds of most of the windows were drawn down; the streets, usually thronged with idlers, were all but deserted; the few shops empty of wares and of customers. Calling to her recollection the frequent prophetic warnings she had indulged in about these evil days to come, Mrs. Tucker's heart smote her. Surely Providence had never taken her at her word and really brought a judgment on the place? If so, seeing her own kith and kin would be amongst the most to suffer, it had read a very wrong meaning in her words; for it stood to reason when folks talked serious-like they didn't always stop to measure what they said, and if a text or two o' Scripture sounded seemly, 'twas fitted in to help their speech out with, not to be pulled abroad to seek the downright meanin' o' each word.

Subdued and oppressed by these and like reflections, Mrs. Tucker reached Uncle Zebedee's house, inside which the change wrought was in keeping with the external sadness. Both girls looked harassed and careworn—Joan, now that there was no further occasion for that display of spirit and bravado which before the soldiers she had successfully contrived to maintain, utterly broken down and apathetically dejected; Eve, unable to enter into all the difficulties or sympathize in the universal danger, ill at ease with herself and irritable with all around her. In her anxiety to hear about Adam—what message he had sent and whether she could not go to see him—she had barely patience to listen to Mrs. Tucker's roundabout details and lugubrious lamentations, and, choosing a very inopportune moment, she broke out with, "What message has Adam sent, Mrs. Tucker? He's sent a message to me, I'm sure: I know he must have."

"Awh, well, if you knaws, you don't want to be told, then," snorted Mrs. Tucker, ill pleased at having her demands upon sympathy put to such sudden flight. "Though don't you think, Eve, that Adam hasn't got somethin' else to think of than sendin' love-messages and nonsense o' that sort? He's a good deal too much took up 'bout the trouble we'm all in for that.—He hoped you was all well, and keepin' yer spirits up, Joan."

"Poor sawl!" sighed Joan: "I 'spects he finds that's more than he can do."

"Ah, you may well say that," replied Mrs. Tucker, casting a troubled look toward her daughter's altered face. "Adam's doin' purtty much the same as you be, Joan—frettin' his insides out."

"He's fretting, then?" gasped Eve, managing to get the words past the great lump which seemed to choke her further utterance.

"Frettin'," repeated Mrs. Tucker with severity. "But there! why should I?" she added, as if blaming her sense of injury. "I keeps forgettin' that, compared with Joan, Eve, you'm nothin' but a stranger, as you may say; and, though I dare say I sha'n't get your thanks for saying it, still Adam could tell 'ee so well as me that fresh faces is all very well in fair weather, but in times of trouble they counts for very little aside o' they who's bin brought up from the same cradle, you may say."

Eve's swelling heart could bear no more. This sense of being set aside and looked on as a stranger was a gall which of late she had been frequently called upon to endure, but to have it hinted at that Adam could share in this feeling toward her—oh, it was too much, and rising hastily she turned to run up stairs.

"Now, there's no call to fly off in no tantrums, Eve," said Mrs. Tucker; "so just sit down now and listen to what else I've got to say."

But Eve's outraged love could hide itself no longer: to answer Joan's mother with anything like temper was impossible, and, knowing this, her only refuge was in flight. "I don't want to hear any more you may have to say, Mrs. Tucker;" and though Eve managed to keep under the sharpness of her voice, she could not control the indignant expression of her face, which Mrs. Tucker fully appreciating, she speeded her departure by the inspiriting prediction that if Eve didn't sup sorrow by the spoonful before her hair was gray her name wasn't Ann Tucker.

"Awh, don't 'ee say that," said Joan. "You'm over-crabbit with her, mother, and her only wantin' to hear some word that Adam had sent to her ownself."

"But, mercy 'pon us! her must give me time to fetch my breath," exclaimed Mrs. Tucker indignantly, "and I foaced to fly off as I did for fear that Adam should forestall me and go doin' somethin' foolish!"

"He ain't wantin' to come home?" said Joan hurriedly.

"Iss, but he is, though. And when us see they sodgers go past I thought no other than he'd a set off then and there. As I said to un, ''Tis true you knows o' they that's gone, but how can 'ee tell how many's left behind?'"

Joan shook her head. "They'm all off," she said: "every man of 'em's gone; but, for all that, Adam mustn't come anighst us or show his face in the place. 'Tis held everywhere that this move is nothin' but a decoy to get the men out o' hidin', and that done, back they'll all come and drop down on 'em."

"Well, then, I'd best go back to wanst," cried Mrs. Tucker, starting up, "and try and put a stop to his comin', tho' whether he'll pay any heed to what I say is more than I'll answer for."

"Tell un," said Joan, "that for all our sakes he mustn't come, and say that I've had word that Jonathan's lurkin' nigh about here some place, so I reckon there's somethin'