True to his Colours | Page 7

the Sunday- school, and hear read at church? She could scarcely believe it. It seemed now as if this were altogether another book, just written and printed expressly for her, to meet her case. All the once familiar passages and verses had new life and light in them now. The baby stirred; she hushed it back to sleep. The fire burned low, but she read on,--she was living out of herself.
At last she laid down the little volume, and resting her forehead on her hand, thought long and deeply, her lips moving in silent prayer. Then she started up hastily, stirred and brightened up the fire, and put the room and herself into the best order that she could. Then she took up the Bible again, and gazing at it earnestly, said slowly and half-out loud to herself, "Wherever can this have come from?" And then a voice seemed to speak within her; and lifting up her eyes reverently to that heaven which she had never dared to think about for years past, she exclaimed softly and fervently, as she clasped her hands together: "O my God, thou didst send it! It came to me from heaven!"
But her thoughts were soon recalled to earth again. Her husband's step was heard now. It was past ten o'clock, and he was returning from his club.
It was often now that she had to watch and wait in weariness to as late an hour. "He mustn't see this," she cried shudderingly to herself, as she heard his hand upon the latch; "not yet, not yet!" So, snatching up the little Bible, she placed it deep down under the clothes of the baby's cradle.
CHAPTER TWO.
THE RAILWAY BRIDGE.
The Crossbourne station was not in the town itself, but on the outskirts, about a quarter of a mile distant from the Town Hall. Nevertheless, the town was creeping up to it in the form of a suburb, which would ere long reach the station gates. Crossbourne, the present flourishing manufacturing town, occupied the hills on either side of the little stream, the greater part of it being to the north, in the direction of the parish church. The station itself was on high ground, and looked across over open country, the line in the London direction passing from it through the centre of the town over a noble viaduct of some twenty arches. In the opposite direction the line made a gradual descent from the station, and at a mile's distance passed through a cutting, towards the farther end of which it inclined northwards in a sharp curve.
Just about the middle of this curve, and where the cutting was pretty deep, a massive wooden foot-bridge was thrown across the line. This was at a place not much frequented, as the bridge formed only part of a short cut into a by-road which led to one or two farms on the hill- sides. Along the rails round this ascending curve the ordinary trains laboured with bated breath; and even the dashing express was compelled to slacken here a little in its speed.
It was on the 23rd of December, the same night in which Kate Foster received so mysteriously the little Bible which was dropped with the ring into her parlour, that four men were plodding along in the darkness over a field-way which led to the wooden bridge just mentioned. They were dressed in their ordinary mill or foundry working-clothes, and seemed, from their stealthy walk and crouching manner, to be out on no good or honest errand. Three of them slouched along with their hands deep in their pockets; the fourth carried a bag of some kind, which apparently was no burden to him, for it swung lightly backwards and forwards on two of his fingers. The men's faces were all muffled in scarves, and their caps pulled down over their eyes. As they walked along the field-path in single file they preserved a profound silence. At last they reached a stile which brought them out close to the end of the bridge which was nearest to the up-line, along which the trains to London passed.
It was now nearly half-past ten. Everything around was profoundly still, except the faint wailing of the wind among the telegraph wires. A drizzling rain had been falling at intervals, for the season was remarkably mild for the time of year, though the little air that blew was raw and chilly. It was very dark, nevertheless the great wooden parapet of the bridge could be distinctly seen on either side, as the four men stood on the roadway of the bridge itself midway over the line.
"Ned," said one of the men in a hoarse whisper, "just cross right over, and see if there's any one about."
The man addressed crept cautiously over to the