“My man!” said the stranger, “I can promise you your master will give you a good wigging when he hears that you have sent me away.” “A good--what, sir?” Brown grew red with indignation; but all the same a chill little doubt stole over him. This personage, who was so very sure of his welcome, might after all turn out to be a person whom he had no right to send away. “I said a wigging, my good man. Perhaps you don’t understand that in England. We do in our place. Come,” he said, drawing out the card, and with it a very palpable sovereign, “here’s my name. You can see I’m no impostor. You had better let me see the house.” The card was a very highly glazed foreign-looking piece of pasteboard, and upon it was the name of Mr. Augustus Markham Gaveston, at full length, in old English characters. And now that Brown looked at him again, he seemed to see a certain likeness to Sir William in this pertinacious visitor. He was about the same height, his eyes were the same colour, and there was something in the sound of his voice--Brown thought on the whole it would be best to pocket the indignity and the sovereign, and let the stranger have his way. “I beg your pardon, sir,” he said; “Sir William didn’t say nothing to me about expecting a relation, and I’m not one that likes to take liberties in the absence of the family; but if so be as your mind is set upon it, I think I may take it upon me to let you see the house.” “I thought we should understand each other, sooner or later,” said the stranger, with a smile. “Sir William could not tell you, for he did not know I was coming,” he said, a moment afterwards, with a short laugh. “I’ve come from--a long way off, where people are not--much in the way of writing letters. Besides, it is so long since he’s seen me, I dare say he has forgotten me: but the first glance at my card will bring it all back.” “I don’t doubt it, sir,” said Brown. He had taken the sovereign, though not without doubts and compunctions, and now he felt himself half unwillingly bound to the service of this unknown personage. He admitted him into the hall with a momentary pang. “The house was built by the great-grandfather of the present baronet,” he said. “This hall is considered a great feature. The pillars were brought from Sicily; they’re no imitation, like what you see in many places, but real marble. On the right is the dining-room, and on the left the drawing-room. There is a fine gallery which is only used for balls and so forth----”