He was much changed. The two years of absence, the better outward circumstances, the habit of authority, the necessity of accommodating himself to a life new and strange to him, together with whatever inward thoughts might have had their part in moulding and shaping his mind--all these had had their influence. He was still Myles Heywood; but between him and himself of two years ago there was just the difference that there is between the reflective man and the passionate child. As he stood waiting, a little round, quick-looking fair-haired German man came up to him and began to talk to him. ‘Now, Mr. Heywood, you have finished your business in the town?’ ‘Yes, Herr Sternefeld; I am, as you may see, waiting for the train to Eisendorf.’ ‘How goes all there? The old man is in rather feeble health, I hear.’ ‘Yes. He has not been strong this summer. He thinks he will be better when the cooler weather comes.’ ‘Ah!’ said the little German, ‘and still he keeps grinding away at the business?’ ‘Yes,’ said Myles, rather indifferently; ‘or rather, I do. He leaves it pretty much to me at present.’ ‘Yes, to be sure,’ said Herr Sternefeld, with a somewhat significant nod and smile. And there’s your train. Herr Süsmeyer will be glad to see you back again. _Au revoir!_’ He bustled away, and Myles, stepping forward to take his place in the Eisendorf train, soon forgot him. From the great manufacturing town of ----feld, the home of turbulent spirits and birthplace of social democracy, to the mining and manufacturing village of Eisendorf, was some three quarters of an hour’s railway journey. The way was so thickly set with factories, houses, great collieries, and other evidences of manufacturing industry, that scarcely had these been left behind, and a strip of green grass and some distant hills been allowed a chance of showing themselves in a purer air, than they too were swamped, as it were. More collieries, more great buildings, cranes, hoists, and a canal, became dominant in the landscape, while the train rolled into Eisendorf. Myles got out of the train, and left the station. Going quickly in the September evening through the busy main street, he presently turned aside and went down a kind of alley, at the end of which light and trees were visible. It was the way into a restauration and _Biergarten_, much frequented by the middle and better class of Eisendorf. Here, on almost every evening in the week, music was to be heard, and here, beneath the trees, one might sit and take one’s supper. This was apparently Myles’s intention, for he walked through the lighted garden, seated himself at one of the tables, and gave an order to a waiter, who presently returned bearing a dish, a table-cloth, and all the other paraphernalia of a supper.