258 THE SMUGGLER. 



his good friend; and if there was a being upon earth, on 

 whose head Sir Eobert Croyland would have wished to stamp 

 as on a viper's, it was the placid benign personage who pre- 

 ceded him. 



They entered the room in which the baronet usually sat in 

 a morning to transact his business with his steward, and to 

 arrange his affairs ; and Sir Kobert carefully shut the door be- 

 hind him, trying, during the one moment that his back was 

 turned upon his unwelcome guest, to compose his agitated 

 features into the expression of haughty and self-sufficient tran- 

 quillity which they usually wore. 



" Sit down, Radford," he said; "pray sit down, if it be 

 but for ten minutes,'' and he pointed to the arm-chair on the 

 other side of the table. 



Mr. Radford sat down, and leaned his head upon his hand, 

 looking in the baronet's face with a scrutinizing gaze. If Sir 

 Robert Croyland understood him well, he also understood Sir 

 Robert Croyland, heart and mind, every corporeal fibre, every 

 mental peculiarity. He saw clearly that his companion was 

 terrified ; he divined that he wished to avoid him ; and the 

 satisfaction that he felt at having caught him just as he was 

 going out, at having frustrated his hope of escape, had a plea- 

 sant malice in it, which compensated for a part of all that he 

 had suffered during that morning, as report after report reached 

 him of the utter annihilation of his hopes of immense gain, the 

 loss of a ruinous sum of money, and the danger and narrow 

 escape of his son. He had not slept a wink during the whole 

 of the preceeding night ; and he had passed the hours in a 

 state of nervous anxiety which would have totally unmanned 

 many a strong-minded man when his first fears were realized. 

 But Mr. Radford's mind was of a peculiar construction : ap- 

 prehension he might feel, but never by any chance, discourage- 

 ment. All his pain was in anticipation, not in endurance. 

 The moment a blow was struck, it was over; his thoughts 

 turned to new resources ; and, in reconstructing schemes which 

 had been overthrown, in framing new ones, or pursuing old 

 ones which had slumbered, he instantly found comfort for the 

 past. Thus he seemed as fresh, as resolute, as unabashed by 

 fortune's late frowns, as ever ; but there was a rankling bitter- 

 ness, an eager, wolf-like energy in his heart, which sprung 

 both from angry disappointment and from the desperate aspect 



