his
hearers. Had they had the slightest notion they were offending him, they
would have known it was an air of offence, but, not suspecting that,
they could only judge that he thought the subject a solemn one.

"I would have you believe his word, certainly. He is a man of honour."

A facetious man here took his pipe out of his mouth and winked to his
companions. "You've had private information to that effect, I suppose,
Principal."

Very haughtily Trenholme assented.

He had not been in the room more than a few moments when all this had
passed. He was handed a newspaper, which gave still another account of
the remote incident which was now at last ticklings the ears of the
public, and he was told that the man Cameron was supposed to be the
preacher who was now without. He heard what part Harkness had played,
and he saw that his brother's name was not mentioned in the public
print, was apparently not known. He took a little pains to be genial (a
thing he was certainly not in the habit of doing in that room), in order
to dissipate any impression his offended manner might have given, and
went home.

It is not often a man estimates at all correctly the effect of his own
words and looks; he would need to be a trained actor to do this, and,
happily, most men are not their own looking-glasses. Trenholme thought
he had behaved in a surly and stiff manner, and, had the subject been
less unpleasant, he would rather have explained at once where and who
his brother was. This was his remembrance of his call at the hotel, but
the company there saw it differently.

No sooner had he gone than the facetious man launched his saw-like voice
again upon the company. "He had private information on the subject, _he
had_."

"There's one sure thing," said a stout, consequential man; "he believes
the whole thing, the Principal does."

A commercial traveller who was acquainted with the place put in his
remark. "There isn't a man in town that I wouldn't have expected to see
gulled sooner."

To which a thin, religious man, who, before Trenholme entered, had
leaned to the opinion that there were more things in the world than they
could understand, now retorted that it was more likely that the last
speaker was gulled himself. Principal Trenholme, he asserted, wasn't a
man to put his faith in anything without proofs.

Chellaston was not a very gossiping place. For the most part the people
had too much to do, and were too intent upon thei