ghts, and one of these had ripened into a formal and
somewhat expensive litigation, respecting a certain right of fishing
claimed by each. This legal encounter had terminated in the defeat of
Marston. Mervyn, however, promptly wrote to his opponent, offering him
the free use of the waters for which they had thus sharply contested, and
received a curt and scarcely civil reply, declining the proposed
courtesy. This exhibition of resentment on Marston's part had been
followed by some rather angry collisions, where chance or duty happened
to throw them together. It is but justice to say that, upon all such
occasions, Marston was the aggressor. But Mervyn was a somewhat testy old
gentleman, and had a certain pride of his own, which was not to be
trifled with. Thus, though near neighbors, the parents of the young
friends were more than strangers to each other. On Mervyn's side,
however, this estrangement was unalloyed with bitterness, and simply of
that kind which the great moralist would have referred to "defensive
pride." It did not include any member of Marston's family, and Charles,
as often as he desired it, which was, in truth, as often as his visits
could escape the special notice of his father, was a welcome guest at
Newton Park.

These details respecting the mutual relation in which the two families
stood, it was necessary to state, for the purpose of making what follows
perfectly clear. The young people had now reached the further gate, at
which they were to part. Charles Marston, with a heart beating happily in
the anticipation of many a pleasant meeting, bid him farewell for the
present, and in a few minutes more was riding up the broad, straight
avenue, towards the gloomy mansion which closed in the hazy and somber
perspective. As he moved onward, he passed a laborer, with whose face,
from his childhood, he had been familiar.

"How do you do, Tom?" he cried.

"At your service, sir," replied the man, uncovering, "and welcome
home, sir."

There was something dark and anxious in the man's looks, which
ill-accorded with the welcome he spoke, and which suggested some
undefined alarm.

"The master, and mistress, and Miss Rhoda--are all well?" he asked
eagerly.

"All well, sir, thank God," replied the man.

Young Marston spurred on, filled with vague apprehensions, and observing
the man still leaning upon his spade, and watching his progress with the
same gloomy and curious eye.

At the hall-door he met with