"I dare say he has gone home for the 'Treasures of the Deep,' papa," readily replied Georgina. "Somebody asked him to fetch it just now." He had not gone for the "Treasures of the Deep;" and, as she guessed pretty accurately, he had no intention of returning. He was walking slowly towards the master's house, his temporary home; his head was aching, his brain was burning, and he felt as if all life had gone out of him for ever. That she had been befooling him; that she loved Frederick St. John with an impassioned lasting love, appeared to him as clear as the stars in a frosty sky. But there were no stars then, and no frost; the fineness of the night had gone, and a drizzling rain was falling. He did not heed it; it might wet him if it would, might soak even that gay blue badge on his breast. Two people within view seemed to heed it as little; they were pacing together, arm-in-arm, in a dark part of the grounds, talking in an undertone. So absorbed were they, that both started when Henry came up; they were near a gaslight then, and he recognised George Prattleton. The other face, on which the light shone brightly, he did not know. "How d'ye do?" said Henry. "Do you know whether Prattleton junior has got home yet?" Prattleton junior, the younger of the Reverend Mr. Prattleton's sons, was in the choir under Henry; and the senior chorister had had some trouble with that gentleman at the dinner-table on this, the audit-night. "I don't know anything about Prattleton junior," returned George Prattleton in a testy tone, as if the question itself, or the being spoken to, had annoyed him. Henry walked on, and round the corner came upon the gentleman in question, Prattleton junior, with another of the choristers, Mr. Wilberforce's son Edwin, each having taken as much as was good for him, both to eat and to drink. "Who's that with George?" asked Henry--for it was somewhat unusual to see a stranger in the grounds at night. "Oh, it's a Mr. Rolls," replied young Prattleton: "I heard my brother ask George. He meets him in the billiard rooms." "Well, you be off home, now; you'll get wet. Wilberforce, I'm going in. You can come with me." Young Mr. Prattleton appeared disposed to resist the mandate. He liked being in the rain, he persisted. But the arrival of his father at that moment from the deanery settled the matter. And Henry Arkell, having happened to look back, saw George Prattleton draw the stranger into the shade, and remain in ambush while the minor canon passed. CHAPTER XV. A NIGHT WITH THE GHOSTS.