you
don't mean to tell me--?" he stammered.

The little man made a motion of assent. "I am Samuel C. Newell," he
said drily; "and if you have no objection, I prefer not to break
through my habit of feeding the sparrows. We are five minutes late as
it is."

He quickened his pace without awaiting any reply from Garnett, who
walked beside him in unsubdued wonder till they reached the Luxembourg
gardens, where Mr. Newell, making for one of the less frequented
alleys, seated himself on a bench and drew the fragment of a roll from
his pocket. His coming was evidently expected, for a shower of little
dusky bodies at once descended on him, and the gravel fluttered with
battling wings and beaks as he distributed his dole with impartial
gestures.

It was not till the ground was white with crumbs, and the first frenzy
of his pensioners appeased, that he turned to Garnett and said: "I
presume, sir, that you come from my wife."

Garnett coloured with embarrassment: the more simply the old man took
his mission the more complicated it appeared to himself.

"From your wife--and from Miss Newell," he said at length. "You have
perhaps heard that she is to be married."

"Oh, yes--I read the _Herald_ pretty faithfully," said Miss Newell's
parent, shaking out another handful of crumbs.

Garnett cleared his throat. "Then you have no doubt thought it natural
that, under the circumstances, they should wish to communicate with
you."

The sage continued to fix his attention on the sparrows. "My wife," he
remarked, "might have written to me."

"Mrs. Newell was afraid she might not hear from you in reply."

"In reply? Why should she? I suppose she merely wishes to announce the
marriage. She knows I have no money left to buy wedding-presents," said
Mr. Newell astonishingly.

Garnett felt his colour deepen: he had a vague sense of standing as the
representative of something guilty and enormous, with which he had
rashly identified himself.

"I don't think you understand," he said. "Mrs. Newell and your daughter
have asked me to see you because they are anxious that you should
consent to appear at the wedding."

Mr. Newell, at this, ceased to give his attention to the birds, and
turned a compassionate gaze upon Garnett.

"My dear sir--I don't know your name--" he remarked, "would you mind
telling me how long you have been acquainted with Mrs. Newell?" And
without waiting for an answer he added judicially: "If you wait long
enough s