?'

'You must excuse my niece, sir--that is to say, if you are really
Colonel--'

'Baigent, ma'am. I think you know my name; though how or why that
should be, passes my comprehension.'

She bowed to him, timidly, a trifle stiffly. 'It is an honour to
have met you, sir. I have an aunt at home, an invalid, who will be
very proud when she hears of this. She has followed your career with
great interest--I believe I may say, ever since you were a boy at the
college. She has talked about you so often, you must forgive the
child for being excited. Come, Charis! Thank Colonel Baigent, and
say good-night.'

'But isn't he coming with us?' The child's face fell, and her voice
was full of dismay. 'Oh! but you must! Aunt Louisa will cry her
eyes out if you don't. And on Christmas Eve, too!'

Colonel Baigent looked at Miss Netta.

'I couldn't ask it--I really couldn't,' she murmured.

He smiled. 'The hour is unconventional, to be sure. But if your
aunt will forgive a very brief call there is nothing would give me
greater pleasure.'

He meant it, too!

He fetched his hat, and the three passed out together--down the High
Street, through the passage by the Butter Cross, and along the railed
pavement by the Minster Close. On the colonel's ear their three
footfalls sounded as though a dream. The vast bulk of the minster,
glimmering above the leafless elms, the solid Norman tower with its
edges bathed in starlight, were transient things, born of faery,
unsubstantial as the small figure that tripped ahead of him clutching
a pair of dancing-shoes.

They came to a little low house, hooded with dark tiles and deeply
set in a narrow garden. A dwarf wall and paling divided it from the
Close, and from the gate, where a brass plate twinkled, a flagged,
uneven pathway led up to the front door. So remote it lay from all
traffic, so well screened by the shadow of the minster, that the
inmates had not troubled to draw blind or curtain. Miss Netta,
pausing while she fumbled for the latchkey, explained that her aunt
had a fancy to keep the blinds up, so that when the minster was lit
for evensong she might watch the warm, painted windows without moving
from her couch.

Colonel Baigent, glancing at the pane towards which she waved a hand,
caught one glimpse of the room within, and stood still, with a catch
of his breath. On the wall facing him hung an Oxford frame, and in
the frame was a cheap woodcut, clipped from an ol