And walking across the kitchen, he threw open a further door ceremoniously. Laura followed, pausing just inside the threshold to look round the little musty sitting-room, with its framed photographs, its woollen mats, its rocking-chairs, and its square of mustard-coloured carpet. Mason watched her furtively all the time, to see how the place struck her. "Oh, this isn't as nice as the kitchen," she said decidedly. "What's that?" She pointed to a pewter cup standing stately and alone upon the largest possible wool mat in the centre of a table. Mason threw back his head and chuckled. His great chest seemed to fill out; all his sulky constraint dropped away. "Of course you don't know anythin aboot these parts," he said to her with condescension. "You don't know as I came near bein champion for the County lasst year--no, I'll reckon you don't. Oh! that cup's nowt--that's nobbut Whinthorpe sports, lasst December. Maybe there'll be a better there, by-and-by." The young giant grinned, as he took up the cup and pointed with assumed indifference to its inscription. "What--football?" said Laura, putting up her hand to hide a yawn. "Oh! I don't care about football. But I _love_ cricket. Why--you've got a piano--and a new one!" Mason's face cleared again--in quite another fashion. "Do you know the maker?" he said eagerly. "I believe he's thowt a deal of by them as knows. I bought it myself out o' the sheep. The lambs had done fust-rate,--an I'd had more'n half the trooble of 'em, ony ways. So I took no heed o' mother. I went down straight to Whinthrupp, an paid the first instalment an browt it up in the cart mesel'. Mr. Castle--do yo knaw 'im?--he's the organist at the parish church--he came with me to choose it." "And is it you that play it," said Laura wondering, "or your sister?" He looked at her in silence for a moment--and she at him. His aspect seemed to change under her eyes. The handsome points of the face came out; its coarseness and loutishness receded. And his manner became suddenly quiet and manly--though full of an almost tremulous eagerness. "You like it?" she asked him. "What--music? I should think so." "Oh! I forgot--you're all musical in these northern parts, aren't you?" He made no answer, but sat down to the piano and opened it. She leant over the back of a chair, watching him, half incredulous, half amused. "I say--did you ever hear this? I believe it was some Cambridge fellow made it--Castle said so. He played it to me. And I can't get further than just a bit of it." He raised his great hands and brought them down in a burst of chords that shook the little room and the raftered ceiling. Laura stared. He played on--played like a musician, though with occasional stumbling--played with a mingled energy and delicacy, an understanding and abandonment that amazed her--then grew crimson with the effort to remember--wavered--and stopped.