A Fracas in the Library.

It was still early in the day. Larcom received him gravely in the hall. Captain Lake was at home, as usual, up to one o’clock in the library — the most diligent administrator that Brandon had perhaps ever known.

‘Well, Larkin — letters, letters perpetually, you see. Quite well, I hope? Won’t you sit down — no bad news? You look rather melancholy. Your other client is not ill — nothing sad about Mark Wylder, I hope?’

‘No — nothing sad, Captain Lake — nothing — but a good deal that is strange.’

‘Oh, is there?’ said Lake, in his soft tones, leaning forward in his easy chair, and looking on the shining points of his boots.

‘I have found out a thing, Captain Lake, which will no doubt interest you as much as it does me. It will lead, I think, to a much more exact guess about Mr. Mark Wylder.’

There was a sturdy emphasis in the attorney’s speech which was far from usual, and indicated something.

‘Oh! you have? May one hear it?’ said Lake, in the same silken tone, and looking down, as before, on his boots.

‘I’ve discovered something about his letters,’ said the attorney, and paused.

‘Satisfactory, I hope?’ said Lake as before.

‘Foul play, Sir.’

‘Foul play — is there? What is he doing now?’ said Lake in the same languid way, his elbows on the arms of his chair, stooping forward, and looking serenely on the floor, like a man who is tired of his work, and enjoys his respite.

‘Why, Captain Lake, the matter is this — it amounts, in fact, to fraud. It is plain that the letters are written in batches — several at a time — and committed to some one to carry from town to town, and post, having previously filled in dates to make them correspond with the exact period of posting them.’

The attorney’s searching gaze was fixed on the captain, as he said this, with all the significance consistent with civility; but he could not observe the slightest indication of change. I dare say the captain felt his gaze upon him, and he undoubtedly heard his emphasis, but he plainly did not take either to himself.

‘Indeed! that is very odd,’ said Captain Lake.

‘Very odd;’ echoed the attorney.

It struck Mr. Larkin that his gallant friend was a little overacting, and showing perhaps less interest in the discovery than was strictly natural.

‘But how can you show it?’ said Lake with a slight yawn. ‘Wylder is such a fellow. I don’t the least pretend to understand him. It may be a freak of his.’

‘I don’t think, Captain Lake, that is exactly a possible solution here. I don’t think, Sir, he would write two letters, one referring back to the other, at the same time, and post and date the latter more than a week before the other.’

‘Oh!’ said Lake, quietly, for the first time exhibiting a slight change of countenance, and looking peevish and excited; yes, that certainly does look very oddly.’

‘And I think, Captain Lake, it behoves us to leave no stone unturned to sift this matter to the bottom.’

‘With what particular purpose, I don’t quite see,’ said Lake. ‘Don’t you think possibly Mark Wylder might think us very impertinent?’

‘I think, Captain Lake, on the contrary, we might be doing that gentleman the only service he is capable of receiving, and I know we should be doing something toward tracing and exposing the machinations of a conspiracy.’

‘A conspiracy! I did not quite see your meaning. Then, you really think there is a conspiracy — formed by him or against him, which?’

‘Against him, Captain Lake. Did the same idea never strike you?’

‘Not, I think, that I can recollect.’

‘In none of your conversations upon the subject with — with members of your family?’ continued the attorney with a grave significance.

‘I say, Sir, I don’t recollect,’ said Lake, glaring for an instant in his face very savagely. ‘And it seems to me, that sitting here, you fancy yourself examining some vagrant or poacher at Gylingden sessions. And pray, Sir, have you no evidence in the letters you speak of but the insertion of dates, and the posting them in inverse order, to lead you to that strong conclusion?’

‘None, as supplied by the letters themselves,’ answered Larkin, a little doggedly, ‘and I venture to think that is rather strong.’

‘Quite so, to a mind like yours,’ said Lake, with a faint gleam of his unpleasant smile thrown upon the floor, ‘but other men don’t see it; and I hope, at all events, there’s a likelihood that Mark Wylder will soon return and look after his own business — I’m quite tired of it, and of’ (he was going to say you)—‘of everything connected with it.’

‘This delay is attended with more serious mischief. The vicar, his brother, had a promise of money from him, and is disappointed — in very great embarrassments; and, in fact, were it not for some temporary assistance, which I may mention — although I don’t speak of such things — I afforded him myself, he must have been ruined.’

‘It is very sad,’ said Lake; ‘but he ought not to have married without an income.’

‘Very true, Captain Lake — there’s no defending that — it was wrong, but the retribution is terrible,’ and the righteous man shook his tall head.

‘Don’t you think he might take steps to relieve himself considerably?’

‘I don’t see it, Captain Lake,’ said the attorney, sadly and drily.

‘Well, you know best; but are not there resources?’

‘I don’t see, Captain Lake, what you point at.’

‘I’ll give him something for his reversion, if he chooses, and make him comfortable for his life.’

The attorney, somehow, didn’t seem to take kindly to this proposition. We know he had imagined for himself some little flirtation on this behalf, and cherished a secret tendre for the same reversion. Perhaps he had other plans, too. At all events it flashed the same suspicion of Lake upon his mind again; and he said —

‘I don’t know, Sir, that the Reverend Mr. Wylder would entertain anything in the nature of a sale of his reversion. I rather think the contrary. I don’t think his friends would advise it.’

‘And why not? It was never more than a contingency; and now they say Mark Wylder is married, and has children; they tell me he was seen at Ancona?’ said Lake tranquilly.

‘They tell you! who are they?‘ said the attorney, and his dove’s eyes were gone again, and the rat’s eyes unequivocally looking out of the small pink lids.

‘They — they,’ repeated Captain Lake. ‘Why, of course, Sir, I use the word in its usual sense — that is, there was a rumour when I was last in town, and I really forget who told me. Some one, two, or three, perhaps.’

‘Do you think it’s true, Sir?’ persisted Mr. Larkin.

‘No, Sir, I don’t,’ said Captain Lake, fixing his eyes for a moment with a frank stare on the attorney’s face; ‘but it is quite possible it may be true.’

‘If it is, you know, Sir,&............