his adventures at Rixton.

"Let us have a cup of cocoa first, Kit," her husband suggested. "And a
piece of your nice cake, too," he added.

"Starving as usual," Mrs. Garton smilingly replied. "Didn't you have
your dinner?"

"Why, yes, but it's nearly eleven now, and you promised to be home at
ten."

When the cocoa had been made and brought into the study, Mrs. Garton
looked quizzically at Douglas.

"If I met you on the street I would not recognise you," she remarked.

"So that's the way you treat your friends, is it!" her husband bantered.

"Oh, I don't mean that, Charles," she protested. "But I never saw Mr.
Stanton dressed that way before."

"No wonder you wouldn't recognise me," Douglas smilingly replied. "It
is a splendid disguise at times. Even Dr. Rannage didn't know me when
he came to Rixton."

"What, were you at that meeting?" Garton asked.

"So you heard of it, then?"

"Sure. Why, Dr. Rannage was furious when he came home, and at a recent
session of the Board of Missions he expressed his opinion in no
uncertain manner, so I understand."

"And he is not over it yet," Mrs. Garton remarked. "I was talking to
him for a while to-night, and he told me about his terrible experience
up there. He said that it was not a fit place to send any man, and
that the people were most ignorant and uncouth."

"They were too much for Dr. Rannage, though," Douglas replied. He then
told them in detail about the meeting that night at the Corner. "Dr.
Rannage made a fool of himself," he said in conclusion. "He was not
the proper person to send there."

"Won't you tell me something about Rixton?" Mrs. Garton asked, "and
what you have been doing since you left the city?"

"Tell her about your wrestling bout with Jake Jukes," Garton suggested,
"and the widow and her news-bag of a son, and also about the old
shoemaker and his wayward daughter. Yes, and about the old professor
and his daughters."

"You have given me a big contract," Douglas laughingly replied.

"I know I have, but Kit must hear it."

It was late when the three at last rose to retire. But Douglas did not
mind, for he was glad to have such interested listeners. But the part
of his story that was nearest his heart he did not tell. Not even to
the Gartons would he reveal his love for Nell, and all that she meant
to him.

Douglas walked with Garton down the street the next morning toward the
lawyer's office.

"Well, what is your decision