‘You’ll find a few things of mine here,’ he said. ‘Put it in your pocket, and look at it afterwards. By-the-by, there is a paragraph marked; I meant it for Mutimer. Never mind, give it him when you’ve done with it.’ Alfred bestowed the paper in the breast pocket of his greatcoat, and did not happen to think of it again till late that evening. His discovery of it at length was not the only event of the day which came just too late for the happiness of one with whose fortunes we are concerned. A little after dark, when the bell was ringing which summoned Mutimer’s workpeople to the tea provided for them, Hubert Eldon was approaching the village by the road from Agworth: he was on foot, and had chosen his time in order to enter Wanley unnoticed. His former visit, when he was refused at the Walthams’ door, had been paid at an impulse; he had come down from London by an early train, and did not even call to see his mother at her new house in Agworth. Nor did ho visit her on his way back; he walked straight to the railway station and took the first train townwards. To-day he came in a more leisurely way. It was certain news contained in a letter from his mother which brought him, and with her he spent some hours before starting to walk towards Wanley. ‘I hear,’ Mrs. Eldon had written, ‘from Wanley something which really surprises me. They say that Adela Waltham is going to marry Mr. Mutimer. The match is surely a very strange one. I am only fearful that it is the making of interested people, and that the poor girl herself has not had much voice in deciding her own fate. Oh, this money! Adela was worthy of better things.’ Mrs. Eldon saw her son with surprise, the more so that she divined the cause of his coming. When they had talked for a while, Hubert frankly admitted what it was that had brought him. ‘I must know,’ he said, ‘whether the news from Wanley is true’ ‘But can it concern you, Hubert?’ his mother asked gently. He made no direct reply, but expressed his intention of going over to Wanley. ‘Whom shall you visit, dear?’ ‘Mr. Wyvern.’ ‘The vicar? But you don’t know him personally.’ ‘Yes, I know him pretty well. We write to each other occasionally.’ Mrs. Eldon always practised most reserve when her surprise was greatest--an excellent rule, by-the-by, for general observation. She looked at her son with a half-smile of wonder, but only said ‘Indeed?’ ‘I had made his acquaintance before his coming to Wanley,’ Hubert explained. His mother just bent her head, acquiescent. And with that their conversation on the subject ended. But Hubert received a tender kiss on his cheek when he set forth in the afternoon.