Mr. Blair was striding the carpet with his head down, as one in perplexed thought, a scowl upon his brow. It was something unusual, for he was always bright. He was as slender and good-looking a fellow as he used to be. Mrs. Blair noticed him and spoke. "Have you a headache, Pyefinch?" She had long ago got over the odd sound of his Christian name. Habit familiarizes most things. "No." "What is it, then?" He did not make any answer; seemed not to hear her. Mrs. Blair put the boy down on the hearthrug. The child was baptized Joseph, after Squire Todhetley, whom they persisted in calling their best friend. "Run to papa, Joe. Ask him what the matter is." The young gentleman went swaying across the carpet, with some unintelligible language of his own. Mr. Blair had no resource but to pick him up: and he carried him back to his mother. "What is the matter, Pyefinch?" she asked again, taking his hand. "I am sure you are not well." "I am quite well," he said; "but I have got into a little bother lately. What ails me this evening is, that I find I must tell you of it, and I don't like to do so. There, Mary, send the child away." She knew the nursemaid was busy; would not ring, but carried him out herself. Mr. Blair was sitting down when she returned, staring into the fire. "I had hoped you would never know it, Mary; I had not intended that you should. The fact is----" Mr. Blair stopped. His wife glanced at him; a serene calm in her eyes, a firm reliance in her loving tone. "Do not hesitate, Pyefinch. The greater the calamity, the more need that I should hear it." "Nay, it is no such great mischief as to be called a calamity. When I took to this house and school, I incurred a debt, and I am suddenly called upon to pay it." "Do you mean Mr. Todhetley's?" A smile at the question crossed the schoolmaster's face. "Mr. Todhetley's was a present; I thought you understood that, Mary. When I would have spoken of returning it, you may remember that he went into a passion." "What debt is it, then?" "I paid four hundred pounds, you know, for the school; half of it I had saved; the other half was given by Mr. Todhetley. Well and good, so far. But I had not thought of one thing--the money that would be wanted for current expenses, and for the hundred and one odd things that stare you in the face upon taking to a new concern. Repairs had to be done, furniture to be bought in; and not a penny coming in until the end of the quarter: not much then, for most of the boys pay half-yearly. Lockett, who was down here most days, saw that if I could not get some money to go on with, there would be no resource but to re-sell the school. He bestirred himself, and got me the loan of a hundred and fifty pounds from a friend, at only five per cent. interest. This money I am suddenly called upon to repay." "But why?" "Because he from whom I had it is dead, and the executors have called it in. It was Mr Wells."