of wood by the wayside, for all
the notice bestowed upon her by the man whose favour she had travelled
some hundreds of miles to obtain.

Another moment and he had left the shop, leaving Margot to draw out her
purse and pay for her purchases in a tingling of pique and
disappointment.

"That gentleman will be staying up at the Nag's Head with yourself,"
vouchsafed the spotted postmaster affably. "A fine gentleman--a ferry
fine gentleman! They say he will be a ferry great man up in London. I
suppose you will be hearing of his name?"

Margot's response was somewhat depressed in tone.

"Yes. She had heard of Mr Elgood... She would take four, not five,
postcards of the Nag's Head. No; there was nothing else she was
needing. The two penny packets of notepaper were certainly very cheap,
the coloured tints and scalloped borders quite wonderful to behold; but
she did not require any to-day, thank you. Perhaps another time. Good
morning!"

Outside in the road Ronald was pacing up and down, twirling his stick,
and looking bright and animated. He came hurrying back to meet Margot,
hardly waiting to reach her side before breaking into speech.

"Well--well! You saw him? Did you notice the shape of his head? You
can see it all in his face--the force and the insight, the imagination.
The face of a scholar, and the body of a sportsman, A magnificent
combination! Did you notice his walk?"

"Oh, I noticed him well enough. I noticed all there was to see. I have
no complaints to make about his appearance."

"What have you to complain of then? What has gone wrong?"

"He never noticed me!"

Ron laughed; a loud boyish laugh of amusement!

"Poor old Margot! That was it, was it? An unforgivable offence. He
lives up in the clouds, my dear; compared with him, you and I are
miserable little earth-worms crawling about the ground. It will take
some time before he is even aware of our presence. We will have to make
friends with the brother, and trust by degrees to make him conscious of
our existence. It's worth waiting for!"

Ronald was plainly afire with enthusiastic admiration of his hero; but
for once Margot refused to be infected.

"I'm not a worm!" she murmured resentfully. "Worm, indeed! I'm every
bit as good as he!"

For twenty yards she walked on in silence, tilting her chin in petulant
scorn. Then--

"Do you remember the old story of Johnny-head-in-air, Ron?" she asked
mischievously. "He had a fa