In order to see her I used frequently to run down from London to my home on Saturdays and remain till Mondays. With her mother she sat in her seat in front of the Rectory pew, and as she walked down the aisle her face would be illumined by a glad light of welcome. How restful were those Sundays after the wear and tear of London life! How peaceful the days in that sleepy little village hidden away in a leafy hollow three miles from the Great Western line! After we had parted, however, I did not go home for six months. Then, on inquiry, I found that the Blains had sold their place, presumably because they were in want of money, for it was said that they had taken a smaller house facing the Thames, near Laleham, that village a little beyond Shepperton, where in the churchyard lies Matthew Arnold. From all accounts old Blain had lost heavily in speculation and had been compelled to sell his carriages and horses, dispose of many of his pictures, and even part with some of the Louis Seize furniture at Shenley Court, where they had lived. This was, of course, indicative of a very severe reverse of fortune. Since those hours of Mary's love and her subsequent falseness, my life had been a queer series of ups and downs, as it must ever be in journalistic London. Many dreary days of changeful care had come and gone since then. I sat silent, thinking, with her letter still open in my hand. "Why are you so confoundedly glum, old man?" Dick asked. "What's your screed about? Duns in the offing?" "No. It's nothing," I answered evasively, smiling. "Then don't look so down in the mouth," he urged. "Have a peg, and pull yourself together." He had been in India, and consequently termed a whisky-and-soda a "peg." The origin of that expression is a little abstruse, but is supposed to refer pointedly to the pegs in one's coffin. I thrust the letter into my pocket, helped myself to a drink, and lit a cigarette. "It's a really first-class sensation," Dick said, again referring to the curious affair. "Pity I can't publish something of it to-morrow. It's a good thing chucked away." "Yes," I replied. "But Patterson has some object in imposing secrecy on us." "Of course," he answered thoughtfully. There was a pause. We both smoked on. Not a sound penetrated there save the solemn ticking of the clock and the distant strains of a piano in some man's rooms across the square. "Do you know, Frank," my companion said after some reflection, and looking at me with a rather curious expression--"do you know that I have some strange misgivings?" "Misgivings!" I echoed. "Of what?" "Well," he said, "did anything strike you as strange in Patterson's manner?" "To tell the truth," I answered, "something did. His attitude was unusual--quite unusual, to-night." "He's a funny Johnnie. That story of the snake on the pavement--isn't it rather too strange to be believed?"