packet—“this was lying on the old man’s table last night. It was probably to give it to you that he sent for you in the afternoon, and then forgot it. Well, good-bye. I shall come to-morrow if the roads are passable. I only hope, for my sake, all this will not make any difference to your remaining at Maxfield.”

Mr Armstrong finished his toilet leisurely, and then proceeded to examine the packet.

It was a large envelope, addressed, “Frank Armstrong, Esquire,” in the old man’s quavering hand.

Within was another envelope, firmly sealed, on which the same hand had written these words—

“To be given unopened into the hands of Roger Ingleton, junior, on his twentieth birthday.”

The effort of writing those few words had evidently been almost more than the writer could accomplish, for towards the end the letters became almost illegible, and the words were huddled in a heap at the corner of the paper. The sealing, too, to judge from the straggling blots of wax all over and the ineffective marks of the seal, must have been the labour of a painful morning to the feeble, half-blind old man.

To the tutor, however, as he held the missive in his hand, and looked at it with the reverence one feels for a token from the dead, it seemed to make one or two things tolerably clear.

First, that the contents, whatever they were, were secret and important, else the old man would never have taken upon himself a labour he could so easily have devolved upon another. Secondly, that this old man, rightly or wrongly, regarded Frank Armstrong as a man to be trusted, and contemplated that a year hence he would occupy the same position with regard to the heir of Maxfield as he did now.

Having arrived at which conclusions, the tutor returned the packet to its outer envelope and locked the whole up in his desk. Which done, he descended to the breakfast-room.

As he had expected, no one was there. What was worse, there was no sign either of fire or breakfast. To a man who has not tasted food for about twenty hours, such a discovery could not fail to be depressing, and Mr Armstrong meekly decided to summon Raffles to his assistance. As he passed down the passage, he could not forbear halting for a moment at the door of a certain room, behind which he knew the mortal remains of his dead employer lay. As he paused, not liking to enter, liking still less to pass on, the sound of footsteps within startled him. It was not difficult, after a moment’s reflection, to guess to whom they belonged, and the tutor softly tapped on the door.

The only answer was the abrupt halting of the footsteps. Mr Armstrong entered and found his pupil.

Roger was standing in the ulster he had worn last night. His eyes were black and heavy with weariness, his face was almost as white as the face of him who lay on the couch, and as he turned to the open door his teeth chattered with cold.

“I couldn’t leave him alone,” whispered he apologetically, as the tutor laid a gentle hand on his arm.

“Of course—of course,” replied Mr Armstrong. “I guessed it was you. Would you rather be left alone?”

“No,” said the lad wearily. “I thought by staying here I should get some help—some—I don’t know what, Armstrong. But instead, I’m half asleep. I’ve been yawning and shivering, and forgotten who was here—and—” Here his eyes filled with tears.

“Dear old fellow,” said the tutor, “you are fagged out. Come and get a little rest.”

Roger sighed, partly to feel himself beaten, partly at the prospect of rest.

“All right!” said he. “I’m ashamed you should see me so weak when I wanted to be strong. Yes, I’ll come—in one minute.”

He walked over to the couch and knelt beside it. His worn-out body had succumbed at last to the misery against which it had battled so long, and for a moment he yielded himself to his sorrow. The tutor waited a moment, and then walked quietly from the room.

For a quarter of an hour he paced restlessly in the cold passage outside; then, as his pupil did not appear, he returned to the chamber of death. Roger Ingleton, as he expected, had fallen asleep where he knelt.

The wretched days between the death and the funeral dragged on in the usual dismal fashion. Mrs Ingleton kept her room; the domestics took the occasion to neglect their work, and Roger Ingleton, minor, passed through all the stages from inconsolable misery to subdued cheerfulness. Mr Armstrong alone went through no stages, but remained the same unimpassioned individual he had been ever since he became a member of the Maxfield household.

“Armstrong,” said the boy, the day before the funeral, “do you know, I’m the only male Ingleton left?”

“I didn’t know it. Have you no uncles or cousins?”

“None on our side. Some distant cousins on, mother’s side, but they’re abroad. We were going over the lot yesterday, mother and I; but we couldn’t scrape up a single relation to come to-morrow. We shall have to get you and Brandram and fathers solicitor to come to the funeral, if you don’t mind.”

“Of course I shall come,” said Mr Armstrong.

“And, by the way, it seems rather queer, doesn’t it, that I shall have charge of all this big property, and, I suppose, be master of all the people about the place.”

“Naturally. Amongst your humble and obedient servants the present tutor of Maxfield will need to be included.”

“Oh, you!” said Roger, smiling; “yes, you’ll need to look out how you behave, you know, or I shall have to terminate our engagement. Isn’t it queer?”

Queer as it was, the tutor winced at the jest, and screwed his eye-glass a little deeper into his eye.

“Seriously, though,” said Roger, “I’m awfully glad I’ve got you here to advise me. I want to do things well about the place, and keep square with the tenants, and improve a great many things. I noticed a whole lot of cottages to-day that want rebuilding. And I think I ought to build a club-room for the young fellows in the village, and give a new lifeboat to replace the ‘Vega,’ What do you think?”

“I’ll tell you this time to-morrow. Meanwhile what do you say to a ride before dark? It would do you good.”

They had a long trot through the lanes and along the shore, ending with a canter over the downs, which landed the heir of Maxfield at home with a glow in his cheeks and an appetite such as he had not known for a week.

Next day the funeral took place in the family vault at the little churchyard of Yeld. The villagers, as in duty bound, flocked to pay their last respects to the old Squire, whose face for the last twenty years they had scarcely seen, and of whose existence, save on rent-day, many of them had been well-nigh ignorant.

Many an eye turned curiously to the slim, pale boy, as he stood alone, the last of his house, at the open tomb; and many a speculation as to his temper and prospects occupied minds which were supposed to be intent on the solemn words of the Burial Service.

Roger himself, with that waywardness of the attention which afflicts us even in the gravest acts of our life, found himself listening to the words in a sort of dream, while his mind was occupied in reading over to himself the names of his ancestors inscribed on the panels of the vault.

“John Ingleton of Maxfield Manor, who died ye ninth day of June, 1760, aetat 74.

“Peter Ingleton of Maxfield Manor, his son, obiit March 6, 1794.

“Paul Ingleton, only son of above Peter; born January 1, 1790, died September 20, 1844.

“Ruth, beloved wife of Roger Ingleton, Esquire, of Maxfield Manor, who died on February 14, 1865, aged 37.”

Now a new inscription would be added.

“Roger Ingleton, son of the above-named Paul Ingleton, who died January 10, 1885.”

And when that was added, there would yet be space for another name below.

Roger shuddered a little, and brought his mind back with