assuring herself that her door was locked against a surprise, she
climbed over the window-sill and descended with him as we have seen.

Her mother meanwhile, having received Tupcombe's note, found the
news of her husband's illness so serious, as to displace her
thoughts of the coming son-in-law, and she hastened to tell her
daughter of the Squire's dangerous condition, thinking it might be
desirable to take her to her father's bedside. On trying the door
of the girl's room, she found it still locked. Mrs. Dornell called,
but there was no answer. Full of misgivings, she privately fetched
the old house-steward and bade him burst open the door--an order by
no means easy to execute, the joinery of the Court being massively
constructed. However, the lock sprang open at last, and she entered
Betty's chamber only to find the window unfastened and the bird
flown.

For a moment Mrs. Dornell was staggered. Then it occurred to her
that Betty might have privately obtained from Tupcombe the news of
her father's serious illness, and, fearing she might be kept back to
meet her husband, have gone off with that obstinate and biassed
servitor to Falls-Park. The more she thought it over the more
probable did the supposition appear; and binding her own head-man to
secrecy as to Betty's movements, whether as she conjectured, or
otherwise, Mrs. Dornell herself prepared to set out.

She had no suspicion how seriously her husband's malady had been
aggravated by his ride to Bristol, and thought more of Betty's
affairs than of her own. That Betty's husband should arrive by some
other road to-night, and find neither wife nor mother-in-law to
receive him, and no explanation of their absence, was possible; but