would of a certainty have paused. And had he done so, his
whole destiny would assuredly have shaped a different course
from that which he was unconsciously steering.




CHAPTER XXIII

GREGORY'S ATTRITION


Joseph's journey to London was occasioned by his very natural
anxiety to assure himself that Crispin was caught in the toils
of the net he had so cunningly baited for him, and that at
Castle Marleigh he would trouble them no more. To this end he
quitted Sheringham on the day after Crispin's departure.

Not a little perplexed was Cynthia at the topsy-turvydom in
which that morning she had found her father's house. Kenneth
was gone; he had left in the dead of night, and seemingly in
haste and suddenness, since on the previous evening there had
been no talk of his departing. Her father was abed with a
wound that made him feverish. Their grooms were all sick, and
wandered in a dazed and witless fashion about the castle, their
faces deadly pale and their eyes lustreless. In the hall she
had found a chaotic disorder upon descending, and one of the
panels of the wainscot she saw was freshly cracked.

Slowly the idea forced itself upon her mind that there had been