He had kept it by him, not wishing to use it if he could help it.

He had forgotten it,--so he said at times,--having understood from Arabin that he was to have fifty pounds, and having received more.

If it had not come to him from the dean, then it had been sent to him by the Prince of Evil for his utter undoing; and there were times in which he seemed to think that such had been the manner in which the fatal cheque had reached him.

In all that he said he was terribly confused, contradictory, unintelligible,--speaking almost as a madman might speak,--ending always by declaring that the cruelty of the world had been too much for him, that the waters were meeting over his head, and praying for God's mercy to remove him from the world.

It need hardly be said that his poor wife in these days had a burden on her shoulders that was more than enough to crush any woman.
She at last acknowledged to Mr.Walker that she could not account for the twenty pounds.