"We're going to Girdle. I've taken a room at the inn there for you to-night. Your cottage is two miles from there. I'll show you the way and meet you there in the morning--at half-past eight, please. It's water-tight--I had the thatch tended this year--and it's got its own well--good water. It's in the park, by the side of the London road, so you won't be too lonely. Now, your work. Woodman, road-maker, joiner, keeper, forester, gardener--that's what I want." Anthony's brain reeled. "That's what I am myself. Listen. I've inherited this estate, which has been let go for over a hundred years. There isn't a foot of fencing that isn't rotten, a road that you can walk on, a bridge that is safe. The woods--it's all woodland--have gone to blazes. I want to pull it round.... Fifty R.E.'s and a Labour Battalion is what it wants, but that's a dream. I've tried the obvious way. I asked for tenders for mending a twelve-foot bridge. The lowest was seventy pounds. I did it myself, single-handed, in seven days.... I've saved my stamps since then. Well, I've got a small staff." Anthony heaved a sigh of relief. "Two old carters, two carpenters, three magnificent sailors--all deaf, poor chaps--and a little lame engineer. But I haven't an understudy.... I hope you'll like it, and stay. It's a man's life." "I like the sound of it," said Lyveden. "What are you on now?" "Road-making at the moment. The fence is the most important, but the roads are so bad we can't get the timber through. It's all sawn ready--we've got a toy saw-mill--but we can't carry it. You see..." The speaker's enthusiasm had been infectious. Lyveden had found himself violently interested in his new life before he had entered upon it. The next day he had accepted the tiny cabin as his future home, and had had a fire roaring upon the hearth before nine o'clock. Colonel Winchester, who had expected to lodge him at Girdle for the best part of a week, had abetted his determination to take immediate possession with a grateful heart, presenting his new tenant with some blankets and an excellent camp-bed, and putting a waggon at his disposal for the rest of the day. Seven o'clock that evening had found Anthony and his dog fairly installed in their new quarters. And now a month had gone by--to be exact, some thirty-four days, the biggest ones, perhaps, in all Lyveden's life. In that short space of time the man whose faith had frozen had become a zealot.