"He should have gone to Snaresbrook. That was the nearest point, but, however, he could not miss his way. It was straight as an arrow after he get to the 'Green Man,' still keeping main road to the left." Which instructions he followed so implicitly that the pair found themselves finally at Leyton Green. From thence they had to make their way back into the Newmarket Road, and as that way lay along darksome lanes under the shade of arching trees, through patches of Epping Forest, while all the time the rain continued to pour down, steadily and determinedly, it may be imagined how much Mr. Bailey was enamoured of Mortomley and his estate by the time the two clerks reached Homewood. But once within the portals of that place, circumstances put on a more cheerful aspect. A bright fire blazed in the old-fashioned hall, glimpses were caught of well lighted and comfortably furnished rooms. Rupert, with a rare civility, addressed them with a polite hope that they were not very wet, and Mrs. Mortomley, after reading Mr. Swanland's note, sent to inquire if they would not like some tea. With which, Mr. Bailey having readily responded in the affirmative, they were provided presently. Rupert in the meantime having recommended half a glass of brandy, which Merle gulped down thankfully, and Mr. Bailey sipped sullenly, angry a whole one had not been advised. When the dining-room door was shut, and the pair had made an onslaught on the cold fowl and ham sent in with tea for their delectation, Merle remarked, "What a stunning place, ain't it!" "Ay, it is a snug crib enough," replied the other, who had already beheld wreck and ruin wrought in much finer abodes. "They don't seem a bad sort," observed Merle, who, being young to the business, still thought a bankrupt might be a gentleman, and who moreover was not a tip-top swell like Bailey, whose father rented a house at fifty pounds a year, and only let off the first floor in order to make the two obstinate ends meet. "What do you mean?" inquired Bailey. "Why, asking us to have tea and all that," was the innocent answer. "Pooh!" replied his companion. "Why, it is all over now. They don't know it, but the whole place belongs to us, I mean to our governors. The tea is ours, and the bread and butter and the ham, and not this fowl alone, but every hen and chicken on the premises. Hand me over the loaf, I am as hungry as a hunter." Had little Mrs. Mortomley understood matters at that moment as she understood them afterwards, she would, hospitable as was her disposition, have turned those two nice young clerks out into the weather, and told them to make up their accounts in the Works or Thames Street, as they should never enter the house at Homewood so long as she remained in it.