'Oh!' and again he fixed me through his monocle. But he saw I was disinclined to go into details, and his good breeding made further questioning impossible. 'Well,' he said, after a pause, 'Mrs Stuart will be delighted to know all this. Her stepson, Maurice Stuart, has been at the root of all this trouble. I understand he wanted to marry Miss Stuart; but she would have nothing to do with him, and in retaliation he has done his level best to turn the mystery of his uncle's marriage to his own account. He it was who instructed Smart and Scobie. He's an awful waster, I believe, and his stepmother long ago cut him adrift.' This was news to me, but I feigned indifference, and as adroitly as I possibly could turned the subject of our conversation to Joe and the part he had yet to play. 'I think, Monteith,' I said, 'we ought to take him with us to-day to Nithbank House. Mrs Stuart will be interested in him, and wishful, no doubt, to see and talk with him.' 'Oh, certainly,' said Monteith, as he snipped the end off another cigar; 'and, if he's still about, you had better call him at once. The carriage is at the door, I see.' Mrs Stuart had very kindly sent her brougham for us; and so it came to pass that when we left the door Joe was sitting on the dicky beside the coachman, arms folded and eyes front--conscious, however, I felt sure, that Nathan's Betty was approvingly watching him from behind the dining-room curtains. We were received very graciously by Mrs Stuart in the library. I introduced Monteith to her, and she at once apologised for having put him to the trouble and inconvenience of travelling so far. Then she inquired in a very kindly way after my health, and told me that when first her niece had informed her of my residence in the village she felt annoyed that the firm had not advised her; but that, after all, it was perhaps wisely kept from her, as she would only have worried me about business and made herself a nuisance. I laughingly said something in reply about doctors being autocrats, and thanked her for her inquiries and consideration, and, to my great relief, the subject was gradually and agreeably changed to something else. The Hon. Mrs Stuart is tall and angular, and she dresses in stern black, as becometh a sorrowing widow. She has, for a woman, a very square, assertive chin and a somewhat determined mouth; but the effect of the hard, firm chiselling of the lower part of the face is discounted by the kindly expression of her mellow, blue-gray eyes. Her hair is streaked with gray, and she has arrived at that time of life when, for preference, she sits and talks to visitors with her back to the light. As Monteith had surmised, the important business she had referred to in her letter had to do with Miss Stuart's affairs, and as this was causing her great anxiety we went into the matter at once.