"I mean that scarf hanging on the wall there," Casson cried, again indicating with his hand its whereabouts. "It's my old School, or rather House, scarf. But what makes it blow about so? There doesn't seem to be any wind." "House! scarf! colours!" Mrs. Griffiths ejaculated. "I never heard tell of such things. You must be crazy. There's nothing on the wall saving that almanac that was given me by the grocer over in Coalbrookdale for a Christmas present. Have you never seen an almanac before?" "Not made of wool and behaving like that," Casson remarked. Then, going a few steps nearer, he gave vent to a loud exclamation of surprise. There was no scarf there at all, not the vestige of one, only a picture almanac representing an intensely silly-looking girl holding a lawn-tennis racket. "My liver must be very wrong and I must be more than ordinarily bilious," Casson said. "I could have sworn it was a scarf." "You're run down; been working too hard, Mr. Casson," Mrs. Griffiths observed. "What you want is a rest. Go to bed early, and don't try your eyes over books and letter-writing." Casson thanked her for her advice and, turning on his heels, left the kitchen. For one brief second he paused to look back. Mrs. Griffiths was staring after him, and in the depths of her large china-blue eyes, the pupils of which seemed to have grown to an unusual size, he read an expression of curiosity intermingled with fear. The next few hours Casson spent lying on the grassy bank of the stream. There was something wonderfully soothing in the constant rustling of the leaves of the big trees in the avenue, and the eternal babble, babble, babble of the water. At times he construed the sounds into real sighings and whisperings, and fancied he could hear his name called, "Casson! Casson! Casson!" very softly and plaintively, but occasionally with such reality that he started, and had to reassure himself earnestly that it was all imagination. Then the shadows on the white soil of the avenue riveted his attention. That they were only the shadows of the trees he had no doubt, and yet he queried every now and then if he had ever before seen shadows flit about and contort themselves in quite such an incomprehensible manner. The emptiness of the avenue, too, seemed so emphasised. Why was it so deserted? Why weren't there people about--living beings among those dark swaying trees and bushes like there were in the London parks? He did not know if he altogether liked the avenue now, when twilight was coming on. His eyes had tricked him in the kitchen; might they not trick him again out here, and in a rather more alarming manner? He would not look at the avenue again, not till it was broad daylight; he would turn his attention to something else. And then, of course, his eyes rested on the stepping-stones. One, two, three, four, he counted. There was that confounded queer-shaped middle stone again, and that pool! How black