but a glimpse of the fine valley of meadow
and wood which ended in the faint purplish hills, beyond which
somewhere was the Hudson River.

It was evident that our arrival had been telephoned from the lodge at
the gate, for as the machine drew up at the main doorway of the house
a servant in livery appeared and opened the door.

"Ah, Christopher," said my companion. "Is Mr. Radford about?"

"Yes, sir. He'll be up in a minute, sir."

"This is Mr. Canby, Christopher, Master Jeremiah's new tutor."

"Yes, sir, you'll find Miss Redwood and Master Jerry in the library."

We went up the steps while the aged butler (who had lived with John
Benham) followed with the valises, and were ushered into the library,
where my pupil and his governess awaited us.

I am a little reluctant to admit at this time that my earliest
impression of the subject of these memoirs was disappointing. Perhaps
the dead man's encomiums had raised my hopes. Perhaps the barriers
which hedged in this most exclusive of youngsters had increased his
importance in my thoughts. What I saw was a boy of ten, well grown for
his years, who ambled forward rather sheepishly and gave me a moist
and rather flabby hand to shake.

He was painfully embarrassed. If I had been an ogre and Jerry the
youth allotted for his repast, he could not have shown more distress.
He was distinctly nursery-bred and, of course, unused to visitors, but
he managed a smile, and I saw that he was making the best of a bad
job. After the preliminaries of introduction, amid which Mr. Radford,
the steward of the estate, appeared, I managed to get the boy aside.

"I feel a good deal like the Minotaur, Jerry. Did you ever hear of the
Minotaur?"

He hadn't, and so I told him the story. "But I'm not going to eat
_you_," I laughed.

I had broken the ice, for a smile, a genuine joyous smile, broke
slowly and then flowed in generous ripples across his face.

"You're different, aren't you?" he said presently, his brown eyes now
gravely appraising me.

"How different, Jerry?" I asked.

He hesitated a moment and then:

"I--I thought you'd come all in black with a lot of grammar books
under your arms."

"I don't use 'em," I said. "I'm a boy, just like you, only I've got
long trousers on. We're not going to bother about books for awhile."

He still inspected me as though he wasn't quite sure it wasn't all a
mistake. And then again:

"Can you talk Latin?"

"Bless you, I'm afraid not."