rick buildings with very small
windows, each the exact counterpart of the other, and a marvel of
substantial ugliness--kept guard over a pair of tall iron gates, about
six hundred yards apart, approached by stone bridges that spanned the
moat.

Captain Sedgewick rang a bell hanging by the side of one of these gates,
whereat there arose a shrill peal that set the rooks screaming in the
tall elms overhead. An elderly female appeared in answer to this summons,
and opened the gate in a slow mechanical way, without the faintest show
of interest in the people about to enter, and looking as if she would
have admitted a gang of obvious burglars with equal indifference.

"Rather a hideous style of place," said Gilbert, as they walked towards
the house; "but I think show-places, as a general rule, excel in
ugliness. I daresay the owners of them find a dismal kind of satisfaction
in considering the depressing influence their dreary piles of
bricks-and-mortar must exercise on the minds of strangers; may be a sort
of compensation for being obliged to live in such a gaol of a place."

There was a clumsy low stone portico over the door, wide enough to admit
a carriage; and lounging upon a bench under this stony shelter they found
a sleepy-looking man-servant, who informed Captain Sedgewick that Sir
David was at Heatherly, but that he was out shooting with his friends at
this present moment. In his absence the man would be very happy to show
the house to Captain Sedgewick and his party.

Gilbert Fenton asked about John Saltram.

Yes, Mr. Saltram had arrived at Heatherly on Tuesday evening, two nights
ago.

They went over the state-rooms, and looked at the pictures, which were
really as good as the Captain had represented them. The inspection
occupied a little more than an hour, and they were ready to take their
departure, when the sound of masculine voices resounded loudly in the
hall, and their conductor announced that Sir David and his friends had
come in.

There were only two gentlemen in the hall when they went into that
spacious marble-paved chamber, where there were great logs burning on the
wide open hearth, in spite of the warmth of the September day. One of
these two was Sir David Forster, a big man, with a light-brown beard and
a florid complexion. The other was John Saltram, who sat in a lounging
attitude on one of the deep window-seats examining his breech-loader. His
back was turned towards the window, and the glar