The crone withdrew her head and vanished.

When the shutter swung open, it displayed the crone standing on one foot, wearing a man's grimy sock, which had fallen down over a broken, run-down shoe.

He thought of his own mother, who had lived and died only a shade or two removed from the old crone's condition.

[Fr.], sot; jobbernowl^, changeling, mooncalf, gobemouche^. dotard, driveler; old fogey, old woman, crock; crone, grandmother; cotquean^, henhussy^. incompetent (insanity) 503. greenhorn &c (dupe) 547; dunce &c (ignoramus) 493; lubber &c (bungler) 701; madman &c 504.

Nothing so familiar in these days, as for a young man to marry an old wife, as they say, for a piece of gold; asinum auro onustum; and though she be an old crone, and have never a tooth in her head, neither good conditions, nor a good face, a natural fool, but only rich, she shall have twenty young gallants to be suitors in an instant.

" "She that was erst a maid as fresh as May, Is now an old crone, time so steals away.

The reception over, old Baldo spoke with the crone who served Madonna Gemma as maid: "I do not know what this pretty little fellow has in mind.

The crone was there also, pretending to doze in the shadows; and so was Foresto the horse-boy, whose dark, still face seemed now and again to mirror Raffaele's look of exultationa look that came only when Madonna Gemma gazed away from him.

But whenever he appeared the crone was there.

" The crone brought two helmets, which Lapo and Baldo put on.

There the crone found her.

Crone had been found lying in a deep pool in the River Till; but the medical testimony showed that he had met his fate by a blow from some sharp instrument, the point of which had penetrated the skull and the frontal part of the brain in such a fashion as to cause instantaneous death.

The man in the dock had been apprehended with Crone's purse in his possessiontherefore, said the police, he had murdered and robbed Crone.

And the police were not over well pleased, and the rest of the folk in court were, to say the least, a little mystified, when Mr. Lindsey asked a few questions of two witnessesof whom Chisholm was one, and the doctor who had been fetched to Crone's body the other.

"I've read all I could about the affairs of both Phillips and Crone, ever since I heard that my name and address had been found on Phillips.

And he wanted to silence me because I'm the only living person that could let out about seeing him at the cross-roads that night and could prove that Crone saw him too.

Mr. Moneylaws, who was senior clerk to Mr. Lindsey, solicitor, of Berwick, was a very promising young man of great ability, and had recently been much before the public eye as a witness in connection with the mysterious murders of John Phillips and Abel Crone, which are still attracting so much attention.

so I just shoved it under the doctor's nose in court, and asked him if that hole in Crone's head couldn't have been made by the spike of it.

"I think Gilverthwaite and Phillips probably were in possession of some secret about Sir Gilbert Carstairs, and that Crone may have somehow got an inkling of it.

Now, as we know, Gilverthwaite died, suddenlyand it's possible that Carstairs killed both Phillips and Crone, as he certainly meant to kill this lad.

Whether this man's Sir Gilbert Carstairs or an impostor, he did his best to murder my clerk, and we suspect him of the murder of Crone, and he's going to be brought to justicethat's flat!

Something occurswe don't know what, yetto make him insecure in his position; without doubt, it's mixed up with Phillips and Gilverthwaite, and no doubt, afterwards, with Crone.

This lad here accidentally knows something which might be fatalCarstairs tries, having, as I believe, murdered Crone, to drown Moneylaws!

"You young men, at least, think every old, toothless gray-haired crone like me ready for the stake, you know.

'Tis a wise old crone! GORA.