Mr. Delorane and his head-clerk were both bending over the same parchment when we entered. Ellin kissed her father, and turned to St. George. "Why have you been saying that you did not drive home William Brook?" she asked as they shook hands. "A moment, my dear; let me speak," interrupted the Squire, who never believed any one's explanation could be so lucid as his own. "Delorane, I left you just now with an apology for having brought to you a cock-and-bull story through the misleading fancies of these boys; but we have come back again to tell you the story's true. Your daughter here says that it was William Brook that St. George had in his gig. And perhaps Mr. St. George"--giving that gentleman a sharp nod--"will explain what he meant by denying it?" "I denied it because it was not he," said Mr. St. George, not appearing to be in the least put out. "How can I tell you it was Brook when it was not Brook? If it had been----" "You met William Brook at the Worcester railway-station yesterday afternoon," interrupted Ellin. "Mrs. James Ashton saw you there; saw the meeting. You _were_ at the station, were you not?" "I was at the station," readily replied St. George, "and Mrs. James Ashton may have seen me there, for all I know--I did not see her. But she certainly did not see William Brook. Or, if she did, I didn't." "Gregory West saw you and him in your gig together later, when you were leaving Worcester," continued Ellin. "It was at the top of Red Hill." St. George shook his head. "The person I had in my gig was a stranger. Had Gregory West come up one minute earlier he would have seen me take the man into it." "William _has_ come," persisted Ellin. "I don't say he has not," returned St. George. "All I can say is that I did not know he had come and that I have not seen him." Who was right, and who was wrong? Any faces more hopelessly puzzled than the two old gentlemen's were, as they listened to these contradictory assertions, I'd not wish to see. Nothing came of the interview; nothing but fresh mystification. Ellin declared William Brook had arrived, had been driven out of Worcester for Timberdale in St. George's gig. We felt equally certain we had passed them in Dip Lane, sitting together in the gig; but St. George denied it in toto, affirming that the person with him was a stranger.