bulky tom-cat who, jumping on the arm of Dickie's chair,
extended a scooping tentative paw towards his plate, and issued gentle
though peremptory orders to her husband regarding the material needs of
her guest. To Mrs. Chifney such entertainings as the present marked the
red-letter days of her calendar. Temporarily she forgave Chifney the
doubtful nature of his calling and his occasional outbreaks of profane
swearing alike. She ceased to regret that snug might-have-been, little,
grocery business in a country town. She forgot even to hanker after
prayer meetings, anniversary teas, and other mild, soul-saving
dissipations unauthorised by the Church of England. She ruffled her
feathers, so to speak, and cooed to the young man half in feudal, half
in unsatisfied maternal affection--for Mrs. Chifney was childless. And
it followed that as he teased her a little, going back banteringly on
certain accepted subjects of difference between them, praised, and made
a hole, in her fresh-baked rolls, her nicely browned, fried potatoes,
her clear, crinkled rashers, assuring her it gave one an appetite
merely to sit down in a room so shiningly clean and spick and span, she
was supremely happy. And Dickie was happy too, and blessed the
exercise, the food, and the society of these simple persons, which,
after his evil night, seemed to have restored to him his wiser and
better self.

"He always was the noblest looking young gentleman I ever saw," Mrs.
Chifney remarked subsequently to her husband. "But here at breakfast
this morning, when he said, 'If you won't be shocked, Mrs. Chifney, I
believe I could manage a second helping of that game pie,' his face was
like a very angel's from heaven. Unearthly beautiful, Thomas, and yet a
sort of pain at the back of it. It gave me a regular turn. I had to
shed a few tears afterwards when I got alone by myself."

"You're one of those that see more than's there, half your time,
Maria," the trainer answered, with an unusual effort at sarcasm, for he
was not wholly easy about the young man himself.--"There's something up
with him, and danged if I know what it is." But these reflections he
kept to himself.

Dr. Knott, later that same day, made reflections of a similar nature.
For though Dickie adhered valiantly to his good resolutions--going out
with the second lot of horses between ten and eleven o'clock, riding on
to Banister's farm to inspect the new barn and cowsheds in course of
erection, then hu