"It's queer rubbish to keep in such a place," said Luke, carelessly.

The girl's thin lip curved into a curious smile.

"You will bear me witness where I found this," she said, putting the
little parcel into her pocket.

"Why, Phoebe, you're not going to be such a fool as to take that," cried
the young man.

"I'd rather have this than the diamond bracelet you would have liked to
take," she answered; "you shall have the public house, Luke."




CHAPTER IV.

IN THE FIRST PAGE OF "THE TIMES."


Robert Audley was supposed to be a barrister. As a barrister was his
name inscribed in the law-list; as a barrister he had chambers in
Figtree Court, Temple; as a barrister he had eaten the allotted number
of dinners, which form the sublime ordeal through which the forensic
aspirant wades on to fame and fortune. If these things can make a man a
barrister, Robert Audley decidedly was one. But he had never either had
a brief, or tried to get a brief, or even wished to have a brief in all
those five years, during which his name had been painted upon one of the
doors in Figtree Court. He was a handsome, lazy, care-for-nothing