“This was the miller’s living room,” she said sadly. She could just remember when a miller lived in the homestead, and when she had ridden up to the door of the mill accompanied by her father, and the miller, white and jovial, had lifted her down and taken her through a mysterious chamber where great stones turned laboriously and noisily, and the air was filled with a fine white dust. Spedding placed the lamp on the table, and cast his eyes round the room in search of the books. They were not difficult to discover; they had been unpacked, and were ranged in three disorderly rows upon roughly constructed bookshelves. The lawyer turned the lamp so that the full volume of light should fall on the books. Then he went carefully over them, row by row, checking each copy methodically, and half muttering the name of each tome he handled. There were school books, works of travel, and now and again a heavily bound scientific treatise, for her father had made science a particular study. The girl stood with one hand resting on the table, looking on, admiring the patience of the smooth, heavy man at his task, and, it must be confessed, inwardly wondering what necessity there was for this midnight visitation. She had told the lawyer nothing about the red envelope, but instinctively felt that he knew all about it. “_Anabasis_, Xenophon,” he muttered; “Josephus, _Works and Life_; _Essays of Elia_; _Essays_, Emerson; _Essays_, De Quincey. What’s this?” He drew from between two bulky volumes a thin little book with a discolored cover. He dusted it carefully, glanced at the title, opened it and read the title-page, then walked back to the table and seated himself, and started to read the book. The girl did not know why, but there was something in his attitude at that moment that caused her a little uneasiness, and stirred within her a sense of danger. Perhaps it was that up till then he had shown her marked deference, had been almost obsequious. Now that the book had been found he disregarded her. He did not bring it to her or invite her attention, and she felt that she was “out of the picture,” that the lawyer’s interest in her affairs had stopped dead just as soon as the discovery was made. He turned the leaves over carefully, poring over the introduction, and her eyes wandered from the book to his face. She had never looked at him before with any critical interest. In the unfriendly light of the lamp she saw his imperfections--the brutal strength of his jaw, the unscrupulous thinness of the lip, the heavy eyelids, and the curious hairlessness of his face. She shivered a little, for she read too much in his face for her peace of mind. Unconscious of her scrutiny, for the book before him was all-engrossing, the lawyer went from page to page. “Don’t you think we had better be going?” Kathleen asked timidly. Spedding looked up, and his stare was in keeping with his words. “When I have finished we will go,” he said brusquely, and went on reading.