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The listener’s eyes shone with gratification.

‘Of course we’ve got to remember,’ she said more softly, ‘that father has known very different things.’

‘I don’t care what he has known!’ cried Mr. Ruddiman. ‘I hope I may never have a worse home than the Pig and Whistle. And I only wish I could live here all the rest of my life, instead of going back to that beastly school!’

‘Don’t you like the school, Mr. Ruddiman?’

‘Oh, I can’t say I dislike it. But since I’ve been living here–well, it’s no use thinking of impossibilities.’

Towards midday the pony and trap came back, driven by a lad from Woodbury, who had business in this direction. Miss Fouracres asked him to unharness and stable the pony, and whilst this was being done Mr. Ruddiman stood by, studiously observant. He had pleasure in every detail of the inn life. To-day he several times waited upon passing guests, and laughed exultantly at the perfection he was attaining. Miss Fouracres seemed hardly less pleased, but when alone she still wore an anxious look, and occasionally heaved a sigh of trouble.

Mr. Ruddiman, as usual, took an early supper, and soon after went up to his room. By ten o’clock the house was closed, and all through the night no sound disturbed the peace of the Pig and Whistle.

The morrow passed without news of Mr. Fouracres. On the morning after, just as Mr. Ruddiman was finishing his breakfast, alone in the parlour, he heard a loud cry of distress from the front part of the inn. Rushing out to see what was the matter, he found Miss Fouracres in agitated talk with a man on horseback.

‘Ah, what did I say!’ she cried at sight of the guest. ‘Didn’t I know something was going to happen? I must go at once–I must put in the pony–‘

‘I’ll do that for you,’ said Mr. Ruddiman. ‘But what has happened?’

The horseman, a messenger from Woodbury, told a strange tale. Very early this morning, a gardener walking through the grounds at Woodbury Manor, and passing by a little lake or fishpond, saw the body of a man lying in the water, which at this point was not three feet in depth. He drew the corpse to the bank, and, in so doing, recognised his acquaintance, Mr. Fouracres, with whom he had spent an hour or two at a public-house in Woodbury on the evening before. How the landlord of the Pig and Whistle had come to this tragic end neither the gardener nor any one else in the neighbourhood could conjecture.

Mr. Ruddiman set to work at once on harnessing the pony, while Miss Fouracres, now quietly weeping, went to prepare herself for the journey. In a very few minutes the vehicle was ready at the door. The messenger had already ridden away.

‘Can you drive yourself, Miss Fouracres?’ asked Ruddiman, looking and speaking with genuine sympathy.

‘Oh yes, sir. But I don’t know what to do about the house. I may be away all day. And what about you, sir?’

‘Leave me to look after myself, Miss Fouracres. And trust me to look after the house too, will you? You know I can do it. Will you trust me?’

‘It’s only that I’m ashamed, sir–‘

‘Not a bit of it. I’m very glad, indeed, to be useful; I assure you I am.’

‘But your dinner, sir?’

‘Why, there’s cold meat. Don’t you worry, Miss Fouracres. I’ll look after myself, and the house too; see if I don’t. Go at once, and keep your mind at ease on my account, pray do!’

‘It’s very good of you, sir, I’m sure it is. Oh, I knew something was going to happen! Didn’t I say so?’

Mr. Ruddiman helped her into the trap; they shook hands silently, and Miss Fouracres drove away. Before the turn of the road she looked back. Ruddiman was still watching her; he waved his hand, and the young woman waved to him in reply.