onally some
difficulty in extracting his covenanted wages by personal violence.
That, too, fails now and then.

By and bye a team and a jolting waggon swept into sight, and Mrs.
Hastings rose when the man who drove it pulled his horses up.

"It's Sproatly; I wonder what has brought him here," she said, and as
the man who sprang down walked towards the house she gazed at him
almost incredulously.

"He's quite smart," she added. "I don't see a single patch on that
jacket, and he has positively got his hair cut."

"Is that an unusual thing in Mr. Sproatly's case?" Agatha asked.

"Yes," said Mrs. Hastings. "It's very unusual indeed. What is
stranger still, he has taken the old grease-spotted band off his hat,
after clinging to it affectionately for the last twelve months."

Agatha fancied that the soft hat, which fell shapelessly over part of
Sproatly's face, needed something to replace the discarded band; but in
another moment or two he entered the room. He shook hands with them
both, and then sat down and smiled.

"You are looking remarkably fresh, but appearances are not invariably
to be depended on, and it's advisable to keep the system up to par," he
said. "I suppose you don't want a tonic of any kind."

"I don't," said Mrs. Hastings resolutely; "Allen doesn't, either.
Besides, didn't you get into some trouble over that tonic?"

"It was the cough cure," said Sproatly with a grin. "I sold a man at
Lander's one of the large-sized bottles and when he had taken some he
felt a good deal better. Then he seems to have argued the thing out
like this: if one dose had relieved the cough, a dozen should drive it
out of him altogether, and he took the lot. He slept for forty-eight
hours afterwards, and when I came across him at the settlement he
attacked me with a club. The fault, I may point out, was in his logic.
Perhaps you would like some pictures. I've a rather striking oleograph
of the Deutcher Kaiser. It must be like him, for two of his subjects
recognised it. One hung it up in his shanty. The other asked me to
hold it out, and then pitched a stove billet through the middle of it.
He, however, produced his dollar; said he felt so much better after
what he'd done that he didn't grudge it."

"I'm afraid we're not worth powder and shot," said Mrs. Hastings. "Do
you ever remember our buying any tonics or pictures from you?"

"I don't, though I have felt that you ought to have done it," and
Sproatly, w