ich nothing
seemed complete. It was while this was in progress that a thick-set,
somewhat bulletheaded man came up and addressed the squire by name.

"We don't often see you here, Mr. Fielding."

The squire turned. "Hullo, Ashcott. Your lambs are in force to-night. How
are they behaving themselves?"

"Pretty fair," said Ashcott. "They're getting the strike rot like the
rest of the world. We shan't hold 'em for ever. If any of the Farringmore
lot turned up here, I wouldn't answer for 'em. Lord Wilchester talked of
motoring down the other day, bringing friends if you please to see the
mine, I warned him off--the damn' fool! Simply asking for trouble, as I
told him. 'Well, what's the matter?' he said. 'What do they want?'
'They'd like houses instead of pigsties for one thing,' I said. And he
laughed at that. 'Oh, let 'em go to the devil!' he said. 'I haven't got
any money to spare for luxuries of that kind.' So far as that goes I
believe he is hard up, but then look at the way they live! They'd need to
be multi-millionaires to keep it up."

The man's speech was crude, even brutal, and the girl on Fielding's other
side shivered a little and drew a pace away. It was very evident on which
side his sympathies lay. There was more than a tinge of the street ranter
in his utterance. She was glad that Fielding spared her an introduction.

She tried to turn her attention back to the entertainment, but the coarse
words hung in her memory like an evil cloud. They recalled Green's brief
condemnation of the previous evening. Evidently his point of view was the
same. He regarded the whole social system as evil. Had not the squire
told her that he wanted to reform the world?

The evening wore on, and with unfaltering resource Dick Green kept the
interest of his audience from flagging. He chose his assistants with
insight and skill, and every item on his program scored a success. His
banjo was in almost continuous demand throughout, but finally, just at
the end, he laid it aside.

He took something from his pocket; what it was Juliet could not see, but
she caught the gleam of metal in the lamp-light, and in a moment a great
buzz of pleasure spread through the crowd. And then it began--such music
as she had never dreamed of--such music as surely was never fluted save
from the pipes of Pan. A long, sweet, thrilling note like the call of a
nightingale, starting far away, drawing swiftly nearer, nearer, till she
felt as if it ended aga