If afterwards, but long afterwards, Lucy, recalling the mystery of his
words, confessed to herself that they betrayed guilt, she was then too
much affected to think of anything but her love and his emotion. She
bent down, and with a girlish and fond self-abandonment which none could
have resisted, placed both her hands on his. Clifford started, looked
up, and in the next moment he had clasped her to his heart; and while the
only tears he had shed since his career of crime fell fast and hot upon
her countenance, he kissed her forehead, her cheek, her lips in a
passionate and wild transport. His voice died within him,--he could not
trust himself to speak; only one thought, even in that seeming
forgetfulness of her and of himself, stirred and spoke at his breast,--
flight. The more he felt he loved, the more tender and the more
confiding the object of his love, the more urgent became the necessity to
leave her. All other duties had been neglected, but he loved with a real
love; and love, which taught him one duty, bore him triumphantly through
its bitter ordeal.

"You will hear from me to-night," he muttered; "believe that I am mad,
accursed, criminal, but not utterly a monster! I ask no more merciful
opinion!" He drew himself from his perilous position, and abruptly
departed.

When Clifford reached his home, he found his worthy coadjutors waiting
for him with alarm and terror on their countenances. An old feat, in
which they had signalized themselves, had long attracted the rigid
attention of the police, and certain officers had now been seen at Bath,
and certain inquiries had been set on foot, which portended no good to
the safety of the sagacious Tomlinson and the valorous Pepper. They
came, humbly and penitentially demanding pardon for their unconscious