read,
perhaps, as you in your straightforward nature fancy.'

'If he isn't prejudiced, you are, at any rate,' said Freda.

When they reached the house, Freda went into the drawing-room first, and
Miss Hall heard her exclaiming, as she rushed out of it with a card in
her hand,--

'Serena! Nita! only think! Mr Jones, Melbourne, South Australia! Hurrah!
I never thought I should be so glad to see a card bearing that name.
Morgan! why didn't you ask the gentleman who called on Miss Hall to come
in and wait?'

'I did not know, ma'am,' said the man who was at the door. 'My master
does not always like strangers, and I did not know the gentleman.'

Miss Hall had vanished upstairs during this little interlude with
Morgan, so Freda did not see the agitation of her manner when she took
the card and read the name. Freda went straight into the library, where
she found her father half asleep over a letter.

'Papa! papa! Do you know an old friend of Miss Hall's has called, that
she has not seen for twenty years, and Morgan let him go away?'

'Wasn't she glad, my dear? It is so exciting to see people whose very
faces you have forgotten.'

'Glad, papa? Of course not. He must just have come from Australia, where
her sister is living, and I daresay has brought letters. By the way,
there was a packet near the card.'

'I don't understand people going so far away from their own country.'

'But, papa, Mr Jones--this gentleman--has gone to sleep at Mr
Prothero's, and I daresay they are not prepared for him.'

'Really--well, my dear?'

'Don't you think you had better write and ask him here to dinner, and I
will order a bed to be prepared?'

'Me! My dear!--a perfect stranger!--a bore! Some one full of tiresome
adventures and travellers' stories, and all that sort of thing.'

'He is a clergyman, papa, and a Welshman, I believe. It would only be
hospitable. We must not belie our country. Do write, papa. Think how
anxious Miss Hall must be to hear of her sister.'

'But you say she has a packet of letters.'

'There is nothing like seeing a friend who has seen one's sister, I
should think. Just one line of invitation! We will amuse him. He is very
quiet, Miss Hall says. Here is the paper and a new pen. There's a good
pappy, and--yes, "Presents his compliments"--yes--don't forget the bed.
That's right! Now, just add, "that if he prefers not coming to-night,
you hope he will make a point of spending the day here to-morrow."'

'But