well--" and Mr. Flower wisely left the rest unsaid.

Thus they made the tour of the stables; and though Henry's remarks on
the subject of slapped horse-flesh had been anything but those of an
expert, it was tacitly agreed that Mr. Flower and he had taken to each
other. Nor, as he presently found, were Mr. Flower's interests limited
to horses.

"You're a reader, I see," he said, presently, when they had returned to
the office. "Well, I don't get much time to read nowadays; but there's
nothing I enjoy better, when I've got a pipe lit of an evening, than to
sit and listen to my little daughter reading Thackeray or
George Eliot."

Of course Henry was interested.

"Now there was a woman who knew country life," Mr. Flower continued.
"'Silas Marner,' or 'Adam Bede.' How wonderfully she gets at the very
heart of the people! And not only that, but the very smell of
country air."

And Mr. Flower drew a long breath of longing for Miller's Dale.

Henry mentally furbished up his George Eliot to reply.

"And 'The Mill on the Floss'?" he said.

"And 'Scenes from Clerical Life,'" said Mr. Flower. "There are some rare
strokes of nature there."

And so they went on comparing notes, till a little blue-eyed girl of
about seventeen appeared, carrying a dainty lunch for Henry, and telling
Mr. Flower that his own lunch was ready.

"This is my daughter of whom I spoke," said Mr. Flower.

"She who reads Thackeray and George Eliot to you?" said the Man in
Possession; and, when they had gone, he said to himself "What a bright
little face!"

CHAPTER XXI

LITTLE MISS FLOWER

Little Miss Flower continued to bring Henry his lunch with great
punctuality each day; and each day he found himself more and more
interested in its arrival, though when it had come he ate it with no
special haste. Indeed, sometimes it almost seemed that it had served its
purpose in merely having been brought, judging by the moments of reverie
in which Henry seemed to have forgotten it, and to be thinking of
something else.

Yes, he had soon begun to watch for that bright little face, and it was
hardly to be wondered at; for, particularly come upon against such a
background, the face had something of the surprise of an apparition. It
seemed all made of light; and when one o'clock had come, and Henry heard
the expected footsteps of his little waiting-maid, and the tinkle of the
tray she carried, coming up the yard, her entrance was as though some
one