“Well, I don’t know so much about that,” answered Finch, dubiously. “You see it was on account of them footsteps that Sims and Baker left last month. They had been told about the footsteps, and they made up their minds to go and hear them. They did hear them, and they gave warning next day. They told Mr. Pearce that the place wasn’t lively enough for them. But it was the footsteps that drove them away.” “After what you have told me, I shall be frightened of moving out of my own room after dusk. Listen!” cried Miss Piper, jumping up in alarm. “That’s uncle’s ring at the side bell. He must have got back before his time.” It was as Finch had stated. Kester St. George was staying as his uncle’s guest at Park Newton. The General’s letter found him at Paris, where he had been living of late almost en permanence. It was couched in such a style that he saw clearly if he were to refuse the invitation thus given, a breach would be created between his uncle and himself which might never be healed in time to come; and, distasteful as the idea of visiting Park Newton was to him, he was not the man to let any sentimental rubbish, as he himself would have been the first to call it, stand in the way of any possible advantage that might accrue to him hereafter. Rich though he was, he still hankered after his uncle’s money-bags almost as keenly as in the days when he was so poor; and in his uncle’s letter there were one or two sentences which seemed to imply that the probability of their one day becoming his own was by no means so remote as he had at one time deemed it to be. “And who has so much right to the old boy’s savings as I have?” he asked himself. “Certainly not that scowling black-browed Richard Dering. I hope with all my heart that he’ll be gone back to India—or to Jericho—or to the bottom of the sea—before I get to Park Newton.” But when he did reach Park Newton he found, greatly to his disgust, that Richard Dering was still there, and that there were no signs whatever of his speedy departure. That there was no love lost between the two men was evident both to themselves and others; but although their coolness towards each other could hardly fail to be noticed by General St. George, he never made the slightest allusion to it, but treated them both as if they were the best of possible friends. Kester he treated with greater cordiality than he had ever accorded to him before. Richard and Kester saw hardly anything of each other except at the dinner-table, and then the conversation between them was limited to the baldest possible topics. Richard never sat over his wine, and generally asked and obtained his uncle’s permission to leave the table the moment dessert was placed upon it. He was an early riser, and had breakfasted and was out riding or walking long before his uncle or cousin made their appearance downstairs.