there's summut strange as _we_ can't make
out. I think I sees a little into it, but it is not for me to speak if
the mayster wants to keep things secret. It'll all turn out right in
the end, you may be sure. The old mayster's been getting a bit of a
shake of late, but it is a shake of the right sort. He's been coming
out of some of his odd ways and giving his mind to better things. He's
had his heart broke once, but it seems to me as he's been getting it
mended again."

For the next half hour, the farmer, his wife, and daughter were busy
about their home concerns, and their two guests were left to their own
meditations.

At last a distant door opened, and Mr Tankardew appeared followed by
the young stranger. By the flickering fire Mrs Franklin thought she
saw the traces of tears on both faces, and there was a strange light in
the old man's eyes which she had not seen there before.

"Let me introduce you to a young friend and an old friend in one," he
said, addressing the ladies; "this is Mr John Randolph, a great
traveller."

Mrs Franklin said some kind words expressive of her pleasure in seeing
the gratification Mr Tankardew felt in this renewal of acquaintance.

"Ah! Yes," said the old man; "you may well say gratification. Why,
I've known this young gentleman's father ever since I can remember.
Sam," he added to the farmer, who had just come in, "I'm going to run
away with our young friend here, we shall both take up our quarters at
the inn for to-night. I see it is fairer now. Mrs Franklin, pray make
yourself quite easy. I shall despatch a messenger at once to `The
Shrubbery' with full particulars. Good-night! Good-night!"

And so Mary and her mother were left to their own musings and
conjectures, for the farmer and his family made no allusion afterwards
to the events of the evening.

CHAPTER FIVE.

THE YOUNG MUSICIAN.

A Grand piano being carried into Mr Esau Tankardew's! What next! What
_can_ the old gentleman want with a grand piano? Most likely he has
taken it for a bad debt--some tenant sold up. But say what they may,
the fact is the same. And, stranger still, a tuner pays a visit to put
the instrument in tune. What can it all mean? Marvellous reports, too,
tell of a sudden domestic revolution. The dust and cobwebs have had
notice to quit, brooms and brushes have travelled into corners and
crevices hitherto unexplored, the piano rests in a parlour which smiles
in the gaiety