Sidney wanted to tell her uncle herself of her engagement. Randolph and she had come down to The Anchorage together, and Mrs. Urquhart had received them rather ceremoniously in the drawing-room. Randolph was a stranger to her; and she had no idea of what had taken place. Sidney, felt unable to break the news to her, and wanted to get away to her uncle, and Mrs. Urquhart was only too pleased to entertain any visitor. "You will find him in his workshop. He doesn't do much but smoke and sleep there. I'm afraid his working days are over." Sidney sped away. She did not find her uncle asleep. He was surrounded by papers, and was writing rather laboriously when she entered, but made an attempt to hide his handiwork. When he saw she was alone he stood up, received her greeting, then turned and locked the door behind her. "I will have you to myself," he said, rather desperately. "I want to show you something." Sidney smiled into his anxious-looking face. "Ethel is entertaining a visitor—Randolph Neville. Do you remember him? He has come home, and is staying with Monnie." "He was rather a nice chap. Oh, well, she won't miss you, if he is with her. Sit down. I want to tell you something." Sidney quietly obeyed him. Her own news could keep. She saw that her uncle was full of his own affairs. Major Urquhart leant back in his chair. Looking at him Sidney saw that his hair was rapidly getting white; he had become a careworn old man, and her heart ached for him, for she knew that the atmosphere of love was wanting in his home, and there was but little comfort for him. "I've been making my will," her uncle said solemnly; "one can't tell at my time of life how soon it might be wanted. I've had it drawn up and legally witnessed, and it is here." He patted a businesslike envelope on his table. "I've been writing a letter to my wife explaining the contents of it. The letter I am going to lock up in dear Vernon's writing bureau. She'll soon find that after—after I'm taken. But I want you to know, and only you, where I am going to put my will. I'm not going to have any risk of it being lost; and she's rather thick with that lawyer chap. Upon my word, I'm beginning to suspect everybody nowadays. Look here!" He went up to the fireplace, and, stooping down, took up a bit of the flooring in a recess by the side of it. Sidney followed him, and saw a tin box reposing underneath. "That's where my will is going to be!" he said impressively. "All right, uncle. May it remain there for many a long year." He shook his head.