"I hope nothing has happened to my brother?" said she to the man when she met him in the hall below.
"Are you the footman's sister?" said he, eyeing her curiously.
"Yes, Sir," replied Susan. "There's nothing wrong with him I hope, is there?"
"Wait till you get to Maningtree," replied the man, shaking his head significantly; "you'll hear it all soon enough."
The unexpected summons, the mystery attending it, and these hints and innuendoes, whilst they perplexed Mr. and Mrs. Jeremy, threw poor Susan into an agony of alarm. That something had occurred in which Andrew was concerned was evident; and again the strange passage in his letter about the marriage, the visit of the man with the crooked nose, Mabel's disappearance, and her own dream, all presented themselves vividly to her mind; and although she could not tell how, nor see the links that united them, she could not help fancying that All these circumstances belonged to the same chain of events.
It was towards nine o'clock in the evening when the chaise drove up to the door of the King's Head inn at Maningtree. Several per-
D2
