"Men who ought to be in bed. I came across two men hanging about your gate in the churchyard, and I'm not sure there wasn't a third."
"They're up to nothing. They often sit and smoke there."
"These fellows were up to something. The man I saw plainest was a stranger, and just the sort of man who won't do your parishioners any good to be among them. The other was Sam Brattle."
"He has gone utterly to the dogs," said the Squire.
"He's on the road, Harry; but nobody has gone while he's still going. I had some words with him in his father's presence last week, and he followed me afterwards, and told me he'd see it out with me. I wouldn't tell you, because I didn't want to set you more against them."
"I wish they were out of the place,--the whole lot of them."
"I don't know that they'd do better elsewhere than here. I suppose Mr. Sam is going to keep his word with me."
"Only for the look of that other fellow, I shouldn't think they meant anything serious," said Gilmore.
"I don't suppose they do, but I'll be on the look-out."
"Oh, no; I've a life-preserver, and I'll take a round of the gardens. You come with me, and you can pass home that way. The chances are they'll mizzle away to bed, as they've seen you, and heard Bone'm,--and probably heard too every word you said to Trumbull."
He then got his hat and the short, thick stick of which he had spoken, and turning the key of the door, put it in his pocket. Then the two friends went round by the kitchen garden, and so through to the orchard, and down to the churchyard gate. Hitherto they had seen nothing, and heard nothing, and Fenwick was sure that the men had made their way through the churchyard to the village.
"I'll be about if they do," said the parson.
"What is one against three? You had better let me stay."
Fenwick laughed at this, saying that it would be quite as rational to propose that they should keep watch every night.
"But, hark!" said the Squire, with a mind evidently perturbed.
"Don't you be alarmed about us," said the parson.
"If anything should happen to Mary Lowther!"
"That, no doubt, is matter of anxiety, to which may, perhaps, be added some trifle of additional feeling on the score of Janet and the children. But I'll do my best. If the women knew that you and I were patrolling the place, they'd be frightened out of their wits."
