has the pearls; and they are worth three thousand pounds at least."
"How do you know that she took them?"
"I am certain she took them," said Johnson, emphatically, "although I have only circumstantial evidence to go on. Bithiah was the only person who knew that they were locked in this drawer. Unfortunately, I left my keys behind me when I went out visiting yesterday; so it was easy for her to take them away."
Korah frowned, and combed his beard with his fingers. "So far as I can judge from your story," said he, rebukingly, "this maiden has departed to avoid your love."
"Say rather because I wished to keep her from Finland."
"Well, I will see Finland, brother. If he knows where Bithiah is, she shall be brought back--but not to you. I myself will take her to Koiau and deliver her to her father."
"You take no account of my feelings," said Johnson, bitterly.
"The Lord's work cannot be hindered for your earthly passion. If Buli knew that you wished to take his child from him, he would not protect our missionaries, and the good seed would be sown in barren ground. But we can speak of these things later, Brother Johnson. The first thing to do is to rescue the maiden from the consequences of her foolish flight, I will question Finland. And you?"
"I am going up to London by the mid-day train to see Captain Shackel."
"Why not write or telegraph?" suggested Korah.
"I think it best to be on the spot myself, brother."
The missionary nodded and rose to leave the room. At the door he paused and looked at Johnson keenly from under his shaggy brows.
"Brother," said he in a deep and solemn voice, "your feet are straying from the narrow path. You love this maiden entrusted to your care, and weary after the pearls."
"No, no, I do not. What do I want with the pearls?"
"Brother," Brand shook a menacing finger, "it is known that you owe money. With those pearls you would pay the price of your follies."
"How do you know that I owe money?" asked Johnson, pale to the lips.
"Your handmaiden found a letter swept aside. It was from a tailor, requesting from you payment of eighty pounds due to him. What have you to do with the vanity of dyed garments from Bozrah?"
"My private affairs are my own, Mr. Brand," cried Johnson, with spirit. "I allow no man to discuss them in my presence."
"Brother, brother, your feet go downwards to the pit. A wastrel, a lover of vanities, how can you be the pastor of our Bethesda? Take heed lest you stumble, for soon the eyes of all shall be open to your iniquity."
As the missionary departed, he cast a look over his shoulder, and saw the unhappy minister sink back in his chair with a look of pain. But Brand, in his Pharisaical uprightness, had no pity for the man or for his position. "As he has sown, so shall he reap," muttered he, and dismissed the matter from his mind. He quite forgot that other text, "Bear ye one another's burdens;" yet had he remembered, he would have misapplied it, as he did all other sayings of the Christ whom he professed to follow.
In the meantime he searched for Finland, and found him on the stone jetty, smoking and jesting with some fishermen. When Brand appeared, the young sailor turned his back on him, for he had no love for a half-baked missionary. But Korah, who had the pertinacity of a fanatic, was not to be put off so easily.
"John Finland, come with me. I have need of you."
"Need'll have to be your master then," sneered Jack. "I've more to do than gavort round with psalm-singing critters."
Brand seized the young man's shoulders with a grasp like a pair of pincers. "It is about Bithiah," he said, sourly.
"I don't know any girl of that name."
"She was Tera, when in the bonds of sin."
"Tera!" Jack led the missionary aside, and looked at him with a frown on his handsome face. "And what may you have to say about Tera, Mister Missionary?"
"Where is she, John Finland?"
"How should I know? I am not her keeper."
"So answered Cain when he destroyed his brother's body; but you, John Finland, shall not evade my inquiry about the destruction of a human soul. Tera, as you call her, is gone!--and you have taken her from the fold."
"Tera gone!" Finland paled through his bronzed complexion. "Where has she gone?"
"I ask that," said Brand, sternly. "Last night she left the fold at six o'clock, and has not returned. She went to you, bearing precious jewels."
"I never saw her, I swear! Last time I met her was the evening before yesterday, when Johnson took her away. This comes of her being amongst your psalm-singing lot. You have made away with Tera for the sake of her pearls."
Finland was desperately in earnest, for he clenched his fists, spoke hoarsely, and looked wicked. Brand was sufficiently a judge of human nature to see that this speech was made in all honesty. Whosoever knew where Tera had gone, Jack was not the man. He was as astonished at her disappearance as Brand himself.
"I see you are ignorant of her whereabouts," he said, in a disappointed tone. "We must seek elsewhere for Bithiah."
"Oh, I'll seek for her, I'll find her," said Jack, between his teeth; "and if any harm has come to her, I'll wring that parson's neck! I know him--he loves Tera, and I shouldn't be surprised if he has carried her off. But I'll find her--if she is above ground."
"Above ground?" echoed Brand. "You--you don't think the girl is dead!"
CHAPTER IV
IN THE CORNFIELD
The little town of Grimleigh opened full on to the Channel. Its extension had of necessity been lateral, by reason of the hills which in the rear rose so precipitously as to be hopelessly inaccessible to the builder. But at either extremity the gradient became easier, and here row upon row of houses sloped down towards a lower plane built up of silt. This, too, was well covered, though here again Nature had intervened and the builder had perforce to stay his hand, threatened by the water. A narrow stone jetty ran out abruptly into the harbour, which, sheltered as it was by the high land around, afforded secure haven for those fishers of the deep upon whom in a large degree Grimleigh depended for its prosperity.
As you drew from the sea, the precipitous nature of the land ceased, and far into the hazy distance the undulating down now waved with the ripening corn. The comfortable-looking homesteads scattered here and there seemed almost buried in the golden billows. The distinction, too, between the land and sea folk was sharply marked. The one rarely mingled with the other. When Grimleigh folk left Grimleigh it was mostly for the sea, while Poldew--the market-town some ten miles further inland--was the invariable goal of farmer and farm labourer.
Mr. Carwell owned the farm nearest to Grimleigh. It stretched directly from the ridge where the hills sloped beachwards. A broad highway running through the corn-lands lifted itself over the rise and dropped gradually
