"Andrew Zane," said Duff Salter in a low voice, "your disguise is detected. Yield yourself like a man to your father's executor. You are my prisoner!"
Agnes Wilt awoke and said her prayers, unconscious of any event of the night. At the breakfast-table she met Duff Salter, who took both her hands in his.
"Agnes," said Duff Salter--"let me call you so hereafter--did you hear the bell toll last night?"
"No," she replied with agitation. "For what, Mr. Salter?"
"The good priest of Kensington is dying."
"Beloved friend!" she said, as the tears came to her eyes. "And must he die uncertain of my blame or innocence? Yet he will learn it in that wiser world!"
"Agnes, I require perfect submission from you for this day. Will you give it in all things?"
She looked at him a moment in earnest reflection, and said finally:
"Nothing will be asked of you that you cannot rightfully do. Decision is what is needed now, and I will bring you through triumphantly if you will obey me."
"At eleven o'clock we must go to the magistrate's office. I will walk there with you."
"Am I to be arrested?" she asked, hesitating.
"If you go with me it will not be an arrest."
"Mr. Salter," she cried, in a burst of anguish, "I am not fit to be seen upon the streets of Kensington."
"Yes, yes, poor girl! The mother of God braved no less. You can bear it. But all this morning I must be closely engaged. An important event happened last night. At eleven, positively, be ready to go out with me."
Agnes was ready, and stepped forth into the daylight on the main thoroughfare of Queen Street. Almost every window was filled with gazers; the sidewalks were lined with strollers, loiterers, and people waiting. She might have fainted if Duff Salter's arm had not been there to sustain her.
A large fishwife, with a basket on her head, was standing beside her comely grown daughter, who had put her large basket down, and both devoured Agnes with their eyes.
"Staying in the house, Beck," exclaimed the mother of the girl, "has been healthy for some people."
"Yes, mammy," answered the girl; "it's safer standing in market with catfish. He! he! he!"
A shipbuilder's daughter was on the front steps, a slender girl of dark, smooth skin and features, talking to a grown boy. The girl bowed: "How do you do, Miss Agnes?" The grown boy giggled inanely.