een my cousin?" he cried, as he encountered Jerry, the house servant,
valet, and factotum.

"See him smoking in the garden 'arf a hour ago, S'Richard."

Richard hurried down into the extensive grounds, and came plump upon Mr
Draycott, the well-known military tutor and coach, tramping laboriously
up and down one of the gravel paths, with his hands behind, giving a
loud puff at every second step, for he was an enormously fat man, to
whom walking was a severe trial, but a trial he persevered in from a
wholesome dread that, if he neglected proper exercise, he would grow
worse.

"Hullo, Frayne!" he cried, "I want to see you--" _puff_.

"Yes, sir?"

"Look here, I'm very much put out about you, Frayne--I am,
indeed!"--_puff_.

"What about, sir?"

"Oh, you know"--_puff_. "Of course, I never object to my pupils
having their own hobbies; but you have been carrying your
musical"--_puff_--"whims to excess"--_puff_.

Richard coloured.

"I do not see why a soldier"--_puff_--"should not be a good musician,
though the trumpet"--_puff_--"seems more in the way than the
piano"--_puff_. "But you ought not to have gone in debt over such a
matter"--_puff_.

"In debt, sir?"

"Yes. Don't repeat my words!"--_puff_. "Now, I have warned you against
it!"--_puff_.

"You did, sir; but I don't understand your allusions," said Richard,
though he suspected that he did.

"Then you ought to, sir!"--_puff_. "Hasn't that money-lending
tailor"--_puff_--"just come from dunning you?"

"Yes, sir; but--"

"There, I know all about it. Pay him off, and never get into such a
hobble again"--_puff_. "Coming, my dear!"--_puff_.

Mrs Draycott, an exceedingly thin lady, was calling from the French
window of the drawing-room, and the "Heavy Coach," as his pupils
nicknamed him, went puffing off up to the house.

"Oh, I can't stand this!" said Richard to himself. "I must have a
thorough explanation. Mark shall speak out. Why, Draycott believes it,
too! That scoundrelly little tailor must have told him. Hi! Dillon,
seen my cousin?"

This was to a fellow-pupil, who was coming down the garden.

"Five minutes--ten minutes--ago, going across the Close. Gone to see
the river; it's getting flooded. What's the row?"

"Oh, nothing--nothing."

"But you look as if you were going to knock his head off."

"I am," cried Richard, over his shoulder, as he hurried off.

"That's right. Hit hard! Save me a lock of his hair!" shouted the
yout