ut she was clever at carrying out her own will, that countess-dowager;
more than a match for the single-minded young man. She wrote an urgent
letter to Dr. Ashton, setting forth her own and her daughter's danger if
her nephew, as she styled him, was received at the Rectory; and she
despatched it privately.

It brought forth a letter from Dr. Ashton to Lord Hartledon; a kind but
peremptory mandate, forbidding him to show himself at the Rectory until
the illness was over. Dr. Ashton reminded his future son-in-law that it
was not particularly on his own account he interposed this veto, but for
the sake of the neighbourhood generally. If they were to prevent the
fever from spreading, it was absolutely necessary that no chance visitors
should be running into the Rectory and out of it again, to carry possible
infection to the parish.

Lord Hartledon could only acquiesce. The note was written in terms so
positive as rather to surprise him; but he never suspected the
undercurrent that had been at work. In his straightforwardness he showed
the letter to the dowager, who nodded her head approvingly, but told no
tales.

And so his days went on in the society of the two women at Hartledon;
and if he found himself oppressed with _ennui_ at first, he subsided
into a flirtation with Maude, and forgot care. Elster's folly! He was not
hearing from Anne, for it was thought better that even notes should not
pass out of the Rectory.

Curiously to relate, the first person beyond the Rectory to take the
illness was the man Pike. How he could have caught it was a marvel to
Calne. And yet, if Lady Kirton's theory were correct, that infection was
conveyed by clothes, it might be accounted for, and Clerk Gum be deemed
the culprit. One evening after the clerk had been for some little time at
the Rectory with Dr. Ashton, he met Pike in going out; had brushed close
to him in passing, as he well remembered. However it might have been, in
a few days after that Pike was found to be suffering from the fever.

Whether he would have died, lying alone in that shed, Calne did not
decide; and some thought he would, making no sign; some thought not, but
would have called in assistance. Mr. Hillary, an observant man, as
perhaps it was requisite he should be in time of public danger, halted
one morning to speak to Clerk Gum, who was standing at his own gate.

"Have you seen anything lately of that neighbour of yours, Gum?"

"Which neighbour?" asked the