DEEPER AND DEFPER. 83.

that evening and the morrow ; as far as regarded that
evening, he had formed them in counsel with himself
and in desperation, and to the stifling of the voice
of conscience within him. “But what must be,
must,” said he ; “go there with her I must and shall,
and to go I must have money.”

His plans were, therefore, formed. Reynolds was
out of the way ; his uncle was So, too; and he made
himself sedulously useful in the shop ; he made pills,
and mixed emulsions for coughs and sold boxes of
issue-plaisters, and moved here and there with such
alacrity as astonished and delighted poor Mr. Isaacs,
who was racked that evening with toothache.

“Go and sit down by the parlour-fire,” said
Williams, as the time for shutting up the shop
approached, “TI ’ll make up the books and see that
all is left straight, and you go and make yourself
comfortable.”

Mr. Isaacs, well pleased to leave his post at the
desk, where a draught of cold air came in keenly
against his ailing tooth, went into the back-parlour,
and Williams had the shop all to himself. The
. warehouse-boy put up the shutters, raked out the
fire, and was dismissed for the night. Williams
added up the day-book, counted the money in the
till, put three-and-sixpence in his pocket, and entered
the amount, minus this, in the day-ledger ; and then,
unlocking the shop-safe with a trembling hand,
looked this way and that, and thought if Isaacs should
come in, or if Mr. Osborne should be returning early
by some chance, and peep through a crack of the
shutters. Oh, that miserable if! But why was he
so fearful! Alas, because he intended to take money
as he had already done from the till.