s knew Anna, and
treated her as a highly respected institution. Those who knew a little
German were fond of trying it on her.

It was rather curious, considering how long Anna had been in England,
that she still kept certain little habits acquired in the far-off days
when she had been the young cook of a Herr Privy Councillor. Thus never
did she open the front door with a cheerful, pleasant manner. Also,
unless they were very intimately known to her and to her mistress, she
always kept visitors waiting in the hall. She would forget, that is, to
show them straight into the pretty sitting-room which lay just opposite
her kitchen. She often found herself regretting that the heavy old
mahogany door of the Trellis House lacked the tiny aperture which in
Berlin is so well named a "stare-hole," and which enables the person
inside the front door to command, as it were, the position outside.

But to-day, when she saw who it was who stood on the threshold, her face
cleared a little, for she was well acquainted with the tall young man
who was looking at her with so pleasant a smile. His name was Jervis
Blake, and he came very often to the Trellis House. For two years he
had been at "Robey's," the Army coaching establishment which was, in a
minor degree, one of the glories of Witanbury, and which consisted of a
group of beautiful old Georgian houses spreading across the whole of one
of the wide corners of the Close.

Some of the inhabitants of the Close resented the fact of "Robey's." But
Mr. Robey was the son of a former Bishop of Witanbury, the Bishop who
had followed Miss Forsyth's father.

Bishop Robey had had twin sons, who, unlike most twins, were very
different. The elder, whom some of the oldest inhabitants remembered as
an ugly, eccentric little boy, with a taste for cutting up dead animals,
had insisted on becoming a surgeon. To the surprise of his father's old
friends, he had made a considerable reputation, which had been, so to
speak, officially certified with a knighthood. The professional life of
a great surgeon is limited, and Sir Jacques Robey, though not much over
fifty and still a bachelor, had now retired.

The younger twin, Orlando, was the Army coach. He had been, even as a
little boy, a great contrast to his brother, being both good looking and
anything but eccentric. The brothers were only alike in the success they
had achieved in their several professions, but they had for one another
in full measure th