"Ay, dear lad; I doubt not it looks strange and new to you since you've been in South Africa and London. But it'll soon seem homelike enough. And now you'll like to see your room, and have a wash before supper. Tom, the gardener, shall take in your bicycle and give it a rub over. I've still got the old one here in the coach-house which you left behind. Tom's new, since you left. He's not so clever with the bees as your old friend Evan was, but he's a steadier lad. I fear me Evan led you into some of your scrapes. The fault was partly mine. I shouldn't have let you run wild so much, but I was so wrapped up in my studies--Well, well!" David was careful to play his part sufficiently to say when shown into his old bedroom, "Just the same, father; scarcely a bit altered--but isn't the bed moved--to another place?" "You're right, my boy--Ah! your memory can't be as bad as you pretend. Yes, we moved it there, Bridget and I, because the Archdeacon came once to stay and complained of the draught from the window." "The deuce he did!" said David. "Well, _I_ shan't complain of anything." His father left him and he then proceeded to lay out the small store of things he had brought in his bicycle bag, giving special prominence to the shaving tackle. He had just finished a summary toilet when there was a tap on the door, and, suppressing an exclamation of impatience--for he dearly wanted time and solitude for collected thought--he admitted Bridget. "Well, Nannie," he said, "come for a gossip?"