e might be the questioners to doubt my
threadbare courier tale, I lost no time in running up the steps and
hammering a peal with the heavy knocker. Through the side-lights I could
see that the wide entrance hall was for the moment unoccupied; but at
the knocker-lifting I had a flitting glimpse of some one--a little man
all in sober black--coming down the stair. There was no immediate answer
to my peal, but when I would have knocked again the door was swung back
and I stepped quickly within to find myself face to face with--Margery.

I know not which of the two of us was the more dumbfounded; but this I
do know; that I was still speechless and fair witless when she swept me
a low-dipped curtsy and gave me my greeting.

"I bid you good evening, Captain Ireton," she said, coldly; and then
with still more of the frost of unwelcome in her voice: "To what may we
be indebted for this honor?"

Now, chilling as these words were, they thrilled me to my finger-tips,
for they were the first she had spoken to me since the night of my
offending in the black gorge of the far-off western mountains. None the
less, they were blankly unanswerable, and had the door been open I
should doubtless have vanished as I had come. Of all the houses in the
town this was surely the last I should have run to for refuge had I
known the name of its master; and it was some upflashing of this thought
that helped me find my tongue.

"I never guessed this was your father's house," I stammered, bowing low
to match her curtsy. "I beg you will pardon me, and let me go as I
came."

She laid a hand on the door-knob. "Is--is there any one here whom you
would see?" she asked; and now her eyes did not meet mine, and I would
think the chill had melted a little.

"No. I was begging a night's lodging of a friend whose house is full. He
sent me here with a note to--ah--to your father, as I suppose, though in
his haste he did not mention the name."

She held out her hand. "Give me the letter."

"Nay," said I; "that would be but thankless work. Knowing me, your
father must needs conceive it his duty to denounce me."

"Give it me!" she insisted; this with an impatient little stamp of the
foot and an upglance of the compelling eyes that would have constrained
me to do a far foolisher thing, had she asked it.

So I gave her the letter and stood aside, hat in hand, while she read
it. There were candles in their sconces over the mantel and she moved
nearer to have