beforehand?"

"You want lodgings there?"

"Only for a few days. I came by train a couple of hours ago"—he named a neighbouring town—"and they told me at the hotel that it was uncertain whether I should find accommodation at Mitchelhurst; so I left my luggage there, and walked over to make inquiries."

"I do not think that I can recommend the inn," said the other, doubtfully. "I fear you would find it beery, and smoky, and noisy—the village alehouse, you understand. Sanded floors, and rustics with long clay pipes—that's the kind of thing at the 'Rothwell Arms.'"

"Ah! the 'Rothwell Arms'!"

"And as for lodgings," the old man continued, with something alert and watchful in his manner, "the fact is people don't care to lodge in Mitchelhurst. They live there, a few of them—myself for instance—but there is nothing in the place to attract ordinary visitors."

He paused, but the only comment was—

"Indeed?"

"Nothing whatever," he affirmed. "A little, out-of-the-way, uninteresting village—but you are anxious to stay here?"

The stranger was re-arranging the loosened handkerchief with slender, unskilful fingers.

"For a few days—yes," he repeated, half absently, as he tried to tuck away a hanging end.

"Uncle," said Barbara, with timid eagerness, "doesn't Mrs. Simmonds let lodgings? When that man came surveying, or something, last summer, didn't he have rooms in her house? I'm very nearly sure he did."

Her uncle intercepted, as it were, the stranger's glance of inquiry.

"Perhaps. But I don't think Mrs. Simmonds will do on this occasion."

"Why not?" the other demanded. "I don't suppose I'm more particular than the man who came surveying. If the place is decently clean, why not?"

"Because your name is Harding. I don't know what his might happen to be."

The young man drew himself up, almost as if he repelled an accusation. Then he seemed to recollect himself.

"Yes," he said, "it is. How did you know that?"

The little Mitchelhurst gentleman found such pleasure in his own acuteness that it gave a momentary air of cordiality to his manner.

"My dear sir," he replied, looking critically at Harding's scratched face, "I knew the Rothwells well. I recognise the Rothwell features."

"You must be a keen observer," said the other curtly.

"Voice too," the little man continued. "Especially when you repeated the name of the inn—the Rothwell Arms."

Harding laughed.

"Upon my word! The Rothwells have left me more of the family property than I was aware of."

"Then there was your destination. Who but a Rothwell would ever want to stay at Mitchelhurst?"

"I see. I appear to have betrayed myself in a variety of ways." The discovery of his name seemed to have given him a little more ease of manner of a defiant and half-mocking kind. "What, is there something more?" he inquired, as his new acquaintance recommenced, "And then——"

"Yes, enough to make me very sure. You wear a ring on your little finger which your mother gave you. She used to wear it thirty years ago."

"True!" said Harding, in a tone of surprise. "You knew my mother then?"

"As I say—thirty years ago. She is still living, is she not? And in good health, I trust?"

"Yes." The young man looked at his ring. "You have a good memory," he said, with an inflection which seemed to convey that he would have ended the sentence with a name, had he known one.

The little gentleman took the hint.

"My name is Herbert Hayes." He spoke with careful precision, it was impossible to mistake the words, yet there was something tentative and questioning in their utterance. The young man's face betrayed a puzzled half-recognition.

"I've heard my mother speak of you," he said.

"But you don't remember what she said?"

"Not much, I'm afraid. It is very stupid of me. But that I have heard her speak of you I'm certain. I know your name well."

"There was nothing much to say. We were very good friends thirty years ago. Mrs. Harding might naturally mention my name if she were speaking of Mitchelhurst. Does she often talk of old days?"

"Not often. I shall tell her I met you."

Barbara stood by, wondering and interested, glancing to and fro as they spoke. At this moment she caught her uncle's eye.

"By the way," he said, "I have not introduced you to my niece—my great-niece, to be strictly accurate—Miss Barbara Strange."

Harding bowed ceremoniously, and yet with a touch of self-contemptuous amusement. He bowed, but he remembered that she had seen him slide down a muddy bank on his back by way of an earlier introduction.

"Mr. Rothwell Harding, I suppose I should say?" the old man inquired.

"No. I'm not named Rothwell. I'm Reynold Harding."

"Reynold?"

"Yes. It's an old name in my father's family. That is," he concluded, in the dead level of an expressionless tone, "as old a name as there is in my father's family, I believe."

"I suppose his grandfather was named Reynold," said Mr. Hayes to himself. Aloud he replied, "Indeed. How about Adam?"

Harding constrained himself to smile, but he did it with such an ill grace that Mr. Hayes perceived that he was a stupid prig, who could not take a joke, and gave himself airs.

"About these lodgings?" the young man persisted, returning to the point. "If Miss Strange knows of some, why won't they do for me?"

Mr. Hayes gulped down his displeasure.

"There is only one roof that can shelter you in Mitchelhurst," he said magnificently, "and that is the roof of Mitchelhurst Place."

"Of Mitchelhurst Place?" Reynold was taken by surprise. He made a little step backward, and Barbara, needlessly alarmed, cried, "Mind the ditch!" Her impulsive little scream nearly startled him into it, but he recovered himself on the brink, and they both coloured again, he angrily, she in vexation at having reminded him of his mishap. "How can I go to Mitchelhurst Place?" he demanded in his harshly hurried voice.

"As my guest," said Mr. Hayes. "I am Mr. Croft's tenant. I live there—with my niece."

The young man's eyes went from one to the other. Barbara's face was hardly less amazed than his own.

"Oh thank you!" he said at last. "It's exceedingly good of you, but I couldn't think of troubling you—I really couldn't. The lodgings Miss Strange mentioned will do very well for me, I am sure, or I could manage for a day or two at the inn."

"Indeed—" Mr. Hayes began.

"But I am not particular," said Harding with his most defiant air and in his bitterest tone, "I assure you I am not. I have never been able to afford it. I shall be all right. Pray do not give the matter another thought. I'm very much obliged to you for your kindness, but it's quite out of the question, really."

"No," said Mr. Hayes, resting his little black kid hands on the top of his stick and looking up at the tall young man, "it is out of the question that you should go anywhere else. Pray do not suggest it. You intended to go back to your hotel this evening and to come on to Mitchelhurst to-morrow? Then let us have the pleasure of seeing you to-morrow as early as you like to come."

"Indeed—indeed," protested Harding, "I could not think of intruding."

The little gentleman laughed.

"My dear sir, who is the intruder at Mitchelhurst Place? Answer me that! No," he said, growing suddenly serious, "you cannot go