This man, although a strong Radical, and employed generally by his own side, saw no objection at all to letting Lord Maxwell's heir and representative understand how in his opinion the case was going.

Aldous Raeburn was a person whom everybody respected; confidences were safe with him; and he was himself deeply interested in the affair.

The Raeburns being the Raeburns, with all that that implied for smaller people in Brookshire, little Mr.Burridge was aware of no reason whatever why Westall's employers should not know that, although Mr.Wharton was working up the defence with an energy and ability which set Burridge marvelling, it was still his, Burridge's opinion, that everything that could be advanced would be wholly unavailing with the jury; that the evidence, as it came into final shape, looked worse for Hurd rather than better; and that the only hope for the man lay in the after-movement for reprieve which can always be got up in a game-preserving case.
"And is as a rule political and anti-landlord," thought Aldous, on one of these mornings, as he rode along the edge of the down.

He foresaw exactly what would happen.

As he envisaged the immediate future, he saw one figure as the centre of it--not Marcella, but Wharton! Wharton was defending, Wharton would organise the petition, Wharton would apply for his own support and his grandfather's, through Marcella.