“Well, well! can it be possible, sir!” cried the landlord, beaming all over with delight; “to tell you the truth, that thought did flash over me when you first came in, inasmuch as they were expecting the heir would come here as soon as he learned the terms of his uncle’s will. Welcome to Greenville, Mr. Dinsmore, and long and many a year may you dwell among us. If you hadn’t bound me so to secrecy, how I should have liked to have told my wife and daughter that you were here.” “Not just yet,” warned the stranger; “wait until I return from New Orleans, which will be two days hence, and then you can spread it about to your heart’s content, my good sir.” The old landlord was looking into the handsome, dissipated face with eager scrutiny. “You do not resemble your uncle, George Dinsmore, whom I remember well,” he said, thoughtfully, “and you have changed much since the time when I saw you here before, a little lad.” CHAPTER XIII. LUCK SMILES. “A philosopher tells us that free from all care Is the man who is penniless, homeless and bare; Unbound by ties of relation or friend, No position to hold, no rights to defend; From all common anxieties thus being freed Having nothing to lose, he is happy indeed. He may wander at ease through the busiest streets, With a smile at the care-worried crowd that he meets, And in thoughts on his neighbors’ possessions regale, With naught to perplex him, by no trouble assailed; Of all doubt or depression his mind must be clear-- Having nothing to lose, he has nothing to fear.” The landlord of the Greenville Hotel faithfully kept his promise in revealing to no one the secret which his late guest desired him to keep. And in due time, three days later, the false Mr. John Dinsmore returned to the village, and after partaking of one meal at the hotel, for which he paid liberally from a large roll of bills, he set out at once on foot for Blackheath Hall, which lay on the outskirts of the town. For once fate had been exceedingly kind to the daring adventurer--his hasty letter to the doctor in Newport had come in the nick of time. In John Dinsmore’s haste away from the place where he had so nearly lost his life he had accidentally left behind him a satchel which contained all of his valuable papers. These were handed to the doctor by the nurse at whose cottage the sick man had been stopping. He was just on the point of advertising it--not knowing where his patient was bound for when he left--when two things happened at one and the same time: the total wreck of the train on which he was believed to have been a passenger; and the second, the receipt of the letter, in which Raymond Challoner laid his daring scheme of the winning of a fortune--if he had his co-operation--before him, offering him a goodly share of the Dinsmore millions if he would but help him to obtain them.