The Argosy — page 388: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

The Village Blacksmith. 367 « Ask that fellow which is his master’s room, Reuben,” said Raleigh to the blacksmith, for he could not bring himself to speak to his prisoner. ‘That one with the light,” said Mark ; upon which Reuben threw some gravel at the window indicated. In a minute it was opened, and the Archdeacon in his night-cap looked out and inquired who was there. “Only Reuben Foreman and I, Archdeacon; we caught Mark Brown getting out of the scullery-window, and we have been trying to wake one of the servants to come down and shut it for the last quarter of an hour,” said Raleigh. ‘But what about Mark? Has he escaped?” asked the Arch- deacon anxiously. “ No, he is here ; we wil! take him to the police-station. I am sorry to have disturbed you, but I thought it was not safe to leave the window open. Your servants are sound sleepers indeed,” said Raleigh. ‘Never mind, I’ll shut the window myself. But come. to-morrow morning as early as you can, and tell me all about Mark and how you managed to catch him. Don’t let him go, Raleigh ; hold him fast for Vera’s sake.” “T will, sir, and for your sake and mine too. Good-night. I hope you will sleep well after being disturbed, for you have a trying day before you to-morrow ; I'll be with you early.” ‘ Good-night,” said the Archdeacon, and the window closed ; and Mark’s hope that his master would try to wake the other servants was gone. Mark was shortly after duly lodged at the police-station, where he passed a sleepless night—dread lest he should find in the morning that he had added murder to the list of his crimes keeping him awake. A guilty conscience is a wonderful quickener of the imaginative powers ; Mark’s imagination was not naturally either quick or powerful, but ‘‘ conscience which doth make cowards of us all” so _ sharpened his faculties that he easily pictured to himself the scene _ the next morning at the Rectory if the butler were found dead in his _ bed, or the Fuchsia-bells so fast asleep that no human power could / wake them. Then he saw the laudanum bottle discovered by the beer _ cask, where he, fool as he was, had left it. And then he heard the ' crime of murder fastened on him: he saw himself brought before judge and jury and declared guilty of murder ; he heard the judge pronounce sentence, he imagined himself face to face with death, he mounted the scaffold in imagination, and felt the hangman adjusting the rope round his neck. And then in a white heat he turned on his hard bed _ and tried to sleep. Strange that consciousness of sin and fear of the consequences | should have the power of producing a train of thought lasting for nearly half an hour in a mind rarely capable of any thought at all CORNICLIOO cs) (SO) am