alked along the short avenue which led to the front door of Old
Place he saw his mother kneeling on her gardening mat. He stepped up on
to the grass hoping to elude her sharp eyes and ears, but she had already
seen him.

"Hullo, Timmy!" she called out cheerfully. "What have you been doing with
yourself all this time?"

"I've been sitting reading in the stable-yard of The Trellis House."

"That seems rather a funny thing to do, when you might have been here
helping your Mummy," but she said the words very kindly. Then suddenly
the mention of The Trellis House reminded her of Godfrey Radmore. "I've
got a great piece of news!" she exclaimed. "Guess who's coming here to
spend the week-end with us, Timmy?"

He looked at her gravely and said:--"I think I know, Mum."

She felt taken aback, as she so often was with her strange little son.

"I don't think you do," she cried briskly.

"I think it's"--he hesitated a moment--"Major Radmore, my godfather."

She was very, very surprised. Then her quick Scotch mind fastened on the
one unfamiliar word. "Why _Major_ Radmore?" she asked.

Timmy looked a little confused. "I--I don't know," he muttered
unwillingly. "I thought he was a soldier, Mum."

"Of course he _was_ a soldier. But he isn't a soldier now."

"Isn't it tea-time?" asked Timmy suddenly.

"Yes, I suppose it is."

As they walked towards the house together Janet was telling herself
uneasily that unless Timmy had met Dr. O'Farrell, it was impossible for
him to have learnt through any ordinary human agency that Godfrey Radmore
was coming to Beechfield. Though a devoted, she was not a blind mother,
and she was disagreeably aware that her little son never "gave himself
away." She did not wish to start him on a long romancing explanation
which would embody--if one were to put it in bald English--a lie. So she
said nothing.

They were close to the door of the house when he again took her aback by
suddenly saying:--"I don't think Mrs. Crofton can be a very nice sort of
lady, Mum."

(Then he had seen Mrs. Crofton, and _she_ had told him.)

"Why not, Timmy?"

"I have a sort of feeling that she's horrid."

"Nonsense! If only for your godfather's sake, we must all try and like
her. Besides, my boy, she's in great trouble. Her husband only died two
or three months ago."

"Some people aren't sorry when their husbands die," remarked Timmy.

She pretended not to hear. But as they walked through into the hall
she hear