small bronze he had been
holding raised a warning hand.

'How do you do, Chicksands? Very sorry, but I'm much too filthy to
touch. And I'm horribly busy! These things arrived last night, and
Mr. Levasseur has kindly come over to help me unpack them. Don't
know if you've met him. Mr. Levasseur--Sir Henry Chicksands.'

The man on the floor looked up carelessly, just acknowledging Sir
Henry's slight inclination. Sir Henry's inner mind decided against
him--at once--instinctively. What was a stout fellow, who at any
rate _looked_ as though he were still of military age, doing with
nonsense of this sort, at four o'clock in the day, when England
wanted every able-bodied man she possessed, either to fight for her
or to work for her? At the same time the reflection passed rapidly
through his mind that neither the man nor the name had come up--so
far as he could remember--before the County Tribunal of which he was
Chairman.

'Well, Chicksands, what do you want with me?' said the Squire
abruptly. 'Will you take a chair?' And he pointed to one from which
he hastily removed a coat.

'I have some confidential business to talk to you about,' said Sir
Henry, with a look at the dusty gentleman among the straw.

'Something you want me to do that I'll be bound I shan't want to do!
Is that it?' said Mannering with vivacity.

He stood with his hands on a table behind him, his long spare frame
in a nervous fidget, his eyes bright and hostile, and a spot of red
on either thin cheek. Beside Chicksands, who was of middle height,
solidly built, and moderately stout, with mental and physical
competence written all over him, the Squire of Mannering seemed but
the snippet of a man. He was singularly thin, with a slender neck,
and a small head covered with thick hair, prematurely white, which
tumbled over his forehead and eyes. He had the complexion of a girl,
disproportionately large nose, very sharply and delicately cut as to
bridge and nostril, and a mouth and chin which seemed to be in
perpetual movement. He looked older than Sir Henry, who was verging
on sixty, but he was in fact just over fifty.

Sir Henry smiled a little at the tone of the Squire's question, but
he answered good-humouredly.

'I believe, when we've talked it over, you won't think it
unreasonable. But I've come to explain.'

'I know, you want me to give Gregson notice. But I warn you I'm not
the least inclined to do anything of the kind.' And the speaker
crossed hi