'em
coming, to tell the time by, and p'r'aps to get their parcels. And one
morning--they wouldn't be expecting anything different--one morning,
first there would be a cloud of dust, as usual, and then the coach would
come racing by, and then they would know! For the coach would be dressed
in laurel, all laurel from stem to stern! And the coachman would be
wearing laurel, and the guard would be wearing laurel; and then they
would know, then they would know!"

Harold listened in respectful silence. He would much rather have been
hunting the mole, who must have been a mile away by this time if he had
his wits about him. But he had all the natural instincts of a
gentleman; of whom it is one of the principal marks, if not the complete
definition, never to show signs of being bored.

Selina rose to her feet, and paced the turf restlessly with a short
quarter-deck walk.

"Why can't we do something?" she burst out presently. "He--he did
everything--why can't we do anything for him?"

"Who did everything?" inquired Harold, meekly. It was useless wasting
further longings on that mole. Like the dead, he travelled fast.

"Why, Nelson, of course," said Selina, shortly, still looking restlessly
around for help or suggestion.

"But he's--he's dead, isn't he?" asked Harold, slightly puzzled.

"What's that got to do with it?" retorted his sister, resuming her
caged-lion promenade.

Harold was somewhat taken aback. In the case of the pig, for instance,
whose last outcry had now passed into stillness, he had considered the
chapter as finally closed. Whatever innocent mirth the holidays might
hold in store for Edward, that particular pig, at least, would not be a
contributor. And now he was given to understand that the situation had
not materially changed! He would have to revise his ideas, it seemed.
Sitting up on end, he looked towards the garden for assistance in the
task. Thence, even as he gazed, a tiny column of smoke rose straight up
into the still air. The gardener had been sweeping that afternoon, and
now, an unconscious priest, was offering his sacrifice of autumn leaves
to the calm-eyed goddess of changing hues and chill forebodings who was
moving slowly about the land that golden afternoon. Harold was up and
off in a moment, forgetting Nelson, forgetting the pig, the mole, the
Larkin betrayal, and Selina's strange fever of conscience. Here was
fire, real fire, to play with, and that was even better than messing
with w