with
he could be relied upon to hold his tongue. The episode of the
production of the real Mrs. Quest had taught him that George was a
person of no common powers. He could think and he could act also.

Harold threw on his coat, extinguished the large stable lantern, and
passing out, locked the door of the summer-house and started down the
mount at a trot. The wind had risen steadily during his hours of work,
and was now blowing a furious gale. It was about a quarter to four in
the morning and the stars shone brightly in the hard clean-blown sky.
By their light and that of the waning moon he struggled on in the
teeth of the raging tempest. As he passed under one of the oaks he
heard a mighty crack overhead, and guessing what it was ran like a
hare. He was none too soon. A circular gust of more than usual
fierceness had twisted the top right out of the great tree, and down
it came upon the turf with a rending crashing sound that made his
blood turn cold. After this escape he avoided the neighbourhood of the
groaning trees.

George lived in a neat little farmhouse about a quarter of a mile
away. There was a short cut to it across the fields, and this he took,
breathlessly fighting his way against the gale, which roared and
howled in its splendid might as it swept across the ocean from its
birthplace in the distances of air. Even the stiff hawthorn fences
bowed before its breath, and the tall poplars on the skyline bent like
a rod beneath the first rush of a salmon.

Excited as he was, the immensity and grandeur of the sight and sounds
struck upon him with a strange force. Never before had he felt so far
apart from man and so near to that dread Spirit round Whose feet
thousands of rolling worlds rush on, at Whose word they are, endure,
and are not.

He struggled forward until at last he reached the house. It was quite
silent, but in one of the windows a light was burning. No doubt its
occupants found it impossible to sleep in that wild gale. The next
thing to consider was how to make himself heard. To knock at the door
would be useless in that turmoil. There was only one thing to be done
--throw stones at the window. He found a good-sized pebble, and
standing underneath, threw it with such goodwill that it went right
through the glass. It lit, as he afterwards heard, full upon the
sleeping Mrs. George's nose, and nearly frightened that good woman,
whose nerves were already shaken by the gale, into a fit. Next minute
a