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122 in the hall, a scent of roses abroad; and when Mr. Frere himself comes out to greet me, I feel blessedly, delightedly, restfully happy.

"Run upstairs and take off your things, my dear," he says, and Mrs. Pim, his housekeeper, shows me the way.

Coming down again, I find that he has vanished, but she pushes open the door of a room on the left, and I enter.

It is low and wide, like our Silverbridge rooms, and it is orderly and prim as an old maid's parlour, with great formal bowls of flowers planted about it, and a stiff bean-pot set in the hearth-place. The windows are open, and, though it is September, the late roses nod in at the windows. A big, deep arm-chair is pulled up to one of them, with its back turned to me; approaching to seat myself in it, for a long course of upright chair backs has made me hanker very seriously after something easy, I see the crown of a dark smooth head resting against it. I am about to take a peep round the corner to see who it can be, when the occupant of the chair rises, stretches himself, and opens his mouth for a yawn, stopping midway as he descries me.

"I beg your pardon," he says, shutting his mouth with a snap, "I never heard you come in."

"You are Mr. Frere's nephew," I say, sitting down on the edge of a sofa, and looking at him, "why are you not out shooting?"

"I have been out all the morning How do you know I am Mr. Frere's nephew?"

"There is no one in Charteris," I say, shaking my head; "no one ever comes here, except to see the girls, or Miss Tyburn, or Mr. Russell."

"And are you one of the girls."

"Of course."

"The biggest of them?"

"Oh no! but there are much smaller ones than me. Do you