w from his uncle. Then the baronet strode away, and his
laugh echoed again and again, for it was joy to know that he was feared.

Mr. Long determined to buy a horse for me, and upon my suggestion that I
wished Marmaduke Heath to spend more time in my company, he and I went
up to the Hall to ask Sir Massingberd if he were willing. The squire
received us curtly, and upon hearing of my tutor's intention, declared
that he himself would select a horse for Marmaduke. Then, since he
wished to talk with Mr. Long concerning Mr. Chint, the family lawyer, he
bade me go to his nephew's room, calling upon Grimjaw, a loathsome old
dog, to act as my guide. This beast preceded me up the old oak staircase
to a chamber door, before which it sat and whined. Marmaduke opened this
and admitted me, and we sat talking together.

My tutor found us together, and knowing the house better than the heir
did, offered to play cicerone and show me over. In the state bed-room, a
great room facing the north, he disclosed to us a secret stairway that
opened behind a full-length portrait. Marmaduke, who had been unaware of
its existence, grew ghastly pale.

"The foot of the stairway is in the third bookcase on the left of the
library door," said Mr. Long. "I dare say that nobody has moved the
picture for twenty years."

"Yes, yes!" said Marmaduke passionately. "My uncle has moved it. When I
was ill, upon my coming to Fairburn, I slept here, and I had terrible
visions. I see it all now. He wanted to frighten me to death, or to make
me mad. He would come and stand by my bedside and stare at me. Cruel--
cruel coward!"

Then he begged us to go away. "My uncle will wonder at your long delay.
He will suspect something," he said.

"Peter," observed my tutor gravely, as we went homeward, "whatever you
may think of what has passed to-day, say nothing. I am not so ignorant
of the wrongs of that poor boy as I appear, but there is nothing for it
but patience."

_II.--A Gypsy's Curse_

In a few days I was in possession of an excellent horse, and Marmaduke
had the like fortune. My tutor examined the steed Sir Massingberd had
bought with great attention, and after commenting on the tightness of
the curb, declared that he would accompany us on our first ride. After
we had left the village, he expressed a wish to change mounts with
Marmaduke, and certainly if he had been a horsebreaker he could not have
taken more pains with the animal. In the end he express