o be carrying
about this paper. "One large chest" he credits you with possessing;
it is to be handled quickly and hidden in the orchard, if necessary--
that is, I suppose, if he should be surprised; and to resist him you
have nobody on the premises but your servant maid Tryphena. For what
innocent purpose, pray, does he carry about this memorandum?'

''Myes, I suppose you are right,' Mrs Tresize assented with a little
sigh, and forthwith shifted the conversation. 'But taste your
brandy, please, and tell me how you like it--though, to be sure, it
won't compare with Squire Peneluna's.'

It was, nevertheless, good sound brandy, genuine juice of the grape,
soft and well-matured. The doctor after a sip nodded his approval.

'I dare say, now,' she went on, 'you're accustomed to this sort of
thing? I mean, you must pass a good many nights, year's end to
year's end, in other folk's parlours. . . .' She broke off, and this
time with a genuine sigh. 'I used to wonder in days gone by, if ever
you'd be sitting here. I used to picture you . . . and now it's for
a robber you're waiting!' She ended with a laugh, yet turned her
face away.

But either the doctor was nettled or his mind refused to be diverted
by small talk from the business in hand. He somewhat curtly
commanded Mrs Tresize to indicate on the gun-rack the weapons her
late husband had commonly used, and to find him powder and shot.
For a moment she pouted her lips mutinously, but ended by obeying
him, with a shrug of her handsome shoulders.

She stood watching him while he carefully loaded the weapons and
rammed home the wads. It is possible that she had a mind to relent,
and suggest his whiling the time away with a game of dominoes.
At any rate she went so far as to hazard--with a glance at the ivory
tablets, and another at the hearth and the elbow-chairs--that he
would find the waiting tedious.

'Not if you can supply me with a book, ma'am,' he answered, laying
the two guns on the table, after sweeping the dominoes aside to make
room for them.

Mrs Tresize left the room and returned bearing a volume--Blair's
_Grave_. She understood (she said) that the doctor preferred serious
reading.

'Among all the poets that ever wrote,' said Doctor Unonius blandly,
'with the possible exception of Young, I have the greatest contempt
for Blair. He has the one unpardonable fault (not the one mentioned
by Horace, though he has that, too): he is dishonest. The fi