"Humph!"

"Isn't it too bad, that a mean-souled fellow like him should stand in our way at such a point of time? I could spurn him with my foot! Hah!"

And Jasper clenched his teeth and scowled malignantly.

"I am disappointed, I confess", said Grind. "But angry excitement never helped a cause, good or bad. We must have possession of this child somehow. Martin came down from Reading this morning. I saw him but an hour ago."

"Indeed! What does he say?"

"The indications of coal are abundant. He made very careful examinations at a great number of points. In several places he found it cropping out freely; and the quality, as far as he was able to judge, is remarkably good."

"Will he keep our secret?" said Jasper.

"It is his interest to do so."

"We must make it his interest, in any event. No time is now to be lost."

"I agree with you there. A single week's delay may ruin every thing.

The coal is our discovery, and we are, in all equity, ent.i.tled to the benefit."

"Of course we are. It's a matter of speculation, at best; the lucky win. If we can get an order for the sale, we shall win handsomely.

But, without producing the child, it will be next to impossible to get the order. So we must have her, by fair means or by foul."

"We must," said the lawyer, compressing his lips firmly.

"And have her now."

"Now," responded Grind.

Jasper rose to his feet.

"It's easy enough to say what we must have," remarked Grind, "but the means of gaining our ends are not always at hand. What do you propose doing?"

"I shall get the child."

"Don't act too precipitately. Violence will excite suspicion, and suspicion is a wonderful questioner."

"We must play a desperate game, as things now are, or not play at all," said Jasper.

"True; but the more desperate the game, the more need of coolness, forethought, and circ.u.mspection. Don't forget this. How do you mean to proceed?"

"That is yet to be determined."

"Will you make another effort to influence Claire?"

"No."

"Do you regard him as altogether impracticable?"

"No influence that I can bring would move him."

"You will, then, resort to stratagem or force?"

"One or the other--perhaps both. The child we must have."

"Let me beg of you, Jasper, to be prudent. There is a great deal at stake."

"I know there is; and the risk increases with every moment of delay."

Grind showed a marked degree of anxiety.

"If the child were in our possession now," said Jasper, "or, which is the same, could be produced when wanted, how soon might an order for the sale be procured?"

"In two or three weeks, I think," replied the lawyer.

"Certain preliminary steps are necessary?"

"Yes."

"If these were entered upon forthwith, how soon would the child be wanted?"

"In about ten days."

"Very well. Begin the work at once. When the child is needed, I will see that she is forthcoming. Trust me for that. I never was foiled yet in any thing that I set about accomplishing, and I will not suffer myself to be foiled here."

With this understanding, Jasper and the lawyer parted.

A week or more pa.s.sed, during which time Claire heard nothing from the guardian of f.a.n.n.y; and both he and his wife began to hope that no further attempt to get her into his possession would be made, until the child had reached her twelfth year.

It was in the summer-time, and Mrs. Claire sat, late in the afternoon of a pleasant day, at one of the front-windows of her dwelling, holding her youngest child in her arms.

"The children are late in coming home from school," said she, speaking aloud her thought. "I wonder what keeps them!"

And she leaned out of the window, and looked for some time earnestly down the street.

But the children were not in sight. For some five or ten minutes Mrs.

Claire played with and talked to the child in her arms; then she bent from the window again, gazing first up and then down the street.

"That's Edie, as I live!" she exclaimed. "But where is f.a.n.n.y?"

As she uttered this inquiry, a sudden fear fell like a heavy weight on her heart. Retiring from the window, she hastened to the door, where, by this time, a lady stood holding little Edie by the hand. The child's eyes were red with weeping.

"Is this your little girl?" asked the lady.

"Oh, mamma! mamma!" cried Edie, bursting into tears, as she sprang to her mother's side and hid her face in her garments.

"Where did you find her, ma'am? Was she lost?" asked Mrs. Claire, looking surprised as well as alarmed. "Won't you walk in, ma'am?" she added, before there was time for a reply.