own at the Towers--day like this!"

"Perfectly delicious!" was the answer. Then, in consideration of the
remoteness of mere landscape from personalities, it was safe to
particularise. "I really think that walk in the shrubbery, where the
gentian grew in such quantity, is one of the sweetest places of the kind
I ever was in."

"I know I enjoyed my ..." Mr. Pellew had started to say that he enjoyed
himself there. He got alarmed at his own temerity and backed out ... "my
cigars there," said he. A transparent fraud, for the possessive pronoun
does not always sound alike. "My," is one thing before "self," another
before "cigars." Try it on both, and see. Mr. Pellew felt he was
detected. He could slur over his blunder by going straight on; any topic
would do. He decided on:--"By-the-by, did you see any more of the dog?"

"Achilles? He went away, you know, with Mr. Torrens and his sister, a
few days after."

"I meant that. Didn't you say something about seeing him with the
assassin--the old gamekeeper--what was his name?"

"Old Stephen Solmes? Yes. I saw them walking together, apparently on the
most friendly terms. Gwen told me afterwards. They were walking towards
his cottage, and I believe Achilles saw him safe home, and came back."

"Just so. Torrens told me about the dog when old Solmes came to say
good-bye to him, and do a little more penance in sackcloth and ashes. I
am using Torrens's words. The old chap made a scene--went down on his
knees and burst out crying--and the dog tried to console him. Torrens
seemed quite clear about what was passing in the dog's mind."

"What did he say the dog meant? Can you remember?" Miss Dickenson was
settling down to chat, perceptibly.

"Pretty well. Achilles had wished to say that he personally, so far from
finding fault with Mr. Solmes for trying to shoot him, fully recognised
that he drew trigger under a contract to do so, given circumstances
which had actually come about. He would not endeavour to extenuate his
own conduct, but submitted that he was entitled to a lenient judgment,
on the ground that a hare, the pursuit of which was the indirect cause
of the whole mishap, had jumped up from behind a stone.... Well--I
suppose I oughtn't to repeat all a profane poet thinks fit to say...."

"Please do! Never mind the profanity!" It really was a stimulus to the
lady's curiosity.

Mr. Pellew repeated the apology which the collie's master had ascribed
to him. Achilles had only a