Bessie rose to her feet with a shriek, the heart stopping in her breast.
The door below was ajar, and through the opening peered a face--the
vicious, drunken face of her husband's eldest son, Timothy Costrell. The
man below cast one more look of amazement at the woman standing on the
top stair, at the candle behind her, at the open box. Then an idea
struck him: he sprang up the stairs at a bound.

'By gosh!' he said, looking down at the gold and silver. '_By gosh_!'

Bessie tried to thrust him back.

'What are you here for?' she asked fiercely, her trembling lips the
colour of the whitewashed wall behind. 'You get off at onst, or I'll
call yer father.'

He pushed her contemptuously aside. The swish of her dress caught the
candle, and by good fortune put it out, or she would have been in a
blaze. Now there was only the light from the paraffin lamp in the
kitchen below striking upwards through the open door. She fell against
the doorway of her bedroom, panting and breathless, watching him.

He seated himself in her place, and stooped to look at the box. On the
inside of the lid was pasted a discoloured piece of paper, and on the
paper was written, in a round, laborious hand, the name, 'John
Bolderfield.'

'My blazes!' he said, slowly, his bloodshot eyes opening wider than
ever. 'It's old John's money. So yo've been after it, eh?'