minutes. He said he'd
brought some papers for your lordship's signature."

"The Tower Farm lease, Uncle Rad," remarked Luke.

"I think, Mr. Luke," assented the butler, "that the young gentleman
did mention the word lease."

"Why has that confounded Warren taken himself off just when I want
him?" was Lord Radclyffe's gruff comment as he rose from the table.

"Let me go, sir," insisted Luke.

"No, hang it, boy, you can't sign my name--not yet anyway. I am not
yet a helpless imbecile. Show the young man into the library, Parker.
I can't think why Dobson is always in such a confounded hurry about
leases--sending a fool of a clerk up at most inconvenient hours."

Still muttering half audibly, he walked to the library door, which
Parker held open for him, and even this he did not do without
surreptitiously taking hold of Luke's hand and giving it a friendly
squeeze. For a moment it seemed as if Luke would follow him, despite
contrary orders. He paused, undecided, standing in the middle of the
room, Louisa's kind gray eyes following his slightest movement.

Jim stolidly pulled the cigar box toward him, and Edie, with chin
resting in both hands, looked sulky and generally out of sorts.

Parker--silent and correct of mien--had closed the library door behind
his master, and now with noiseless tread he crossed the dining-room
and opened the other door--the one that gave on the hall. Louisa
instinctively turned her eyes from Luke and saw--standing in the
middle of the hall--a young man in jacket suit and overcoat, who had
looked up, with palpitating eagerness expressed in his face, the
moment he caught sight of Parker.

It was the same man who had lifted his hat to Luke and to herself in
Battersea Park this very morning. Luke saw him too and apparently also
recognized him.

"That's why he bowed to us, Luke--in the park--you remember?" she said
as soon as the door had once more closed on Parker and the visitor.

"Funny that you didn't know him," she continued since Luke had made no
comment.

"I didn't," he remarked curtly.

"Didn't what?"

"I did not and do not know this man."

"Not Mr. Dobson's clerk?"

Luke did not answer but went out into the hall. Parker was standing
beside the library door which he had just closed, having introduced
the visitor into his lordship's presence.

"Parker," said Luke abruptly, "what made you tell his lordship that
that young gentleman came from Mr. Dobson?"

The question had