“It is fine, sir, as you are good enough to observe”--the humble James Cheeseman was proud of his shop--“but not, as you remarked, altogether private. That can hardly be expected, where business is conducted to suit universal requirements. Polly, my dear, if your mother can spare you, come and take my place at the desk a few minutes. I have business inside with this gentleman. You may sell almost anything, except butter. If any one wants that, they must wait till I come back.” A very pretty damsel, with a cap of foreign lace both adorning and adorned by her beautiful bright hair, came shyly from a little door behind the counter, receiving with a quick blush the stranger's earnest gaze, and returning with a curtsey the courteous flourish of his looped-up riding-hat. “What a handsome gentleman!” said Polly to herself; “but there is something very sad and very wild in his appearance.” Her father's conclusion was the same, and his heart misgave him as he led in this unexpected guest. “There is no cause for apologies. This place is a very good one,” the stranger replied, laying down his heavy whip on the table of a stone-floored room, to which he had been shown. “You are a man of business, and I am come upon dry business. You can conjecture--is it not so?--who I am by this time, although I am told that I do not bear any strong resemblance to my father.” He took off his hat as he spoke, shook back his long black hair, and fixed his jet-black eyes upon Cheeseman. That upright dealer had not recovered his usual self-possession yet, but managed to look up--for he was shorter by a head than his visitor--with a doubtful and enquiring smile. “I am Caryl Carne, of Carne Castle, as you are pleased to call it. I have not been in England these many years; from the death of my father I have been afar; and now, for causes of my own, I am returned, with hope of collecting the fragments of the property of my ancestors. It appears to have been their custom to scatter, but not gather up again. My intention is to make a sheaf of the relics spread by squanderers, and snapped up by scoundrels.” “To be sure, to be sure,” cried the general dealer; “this is vastly to your credit, sir, and I wish you all success, sir, and so will all who have so long respected your ancient and honourable family, sir. Take a chair, sir--please to take a chair.” “I find very little to my credit,” Mr. Carne said, dryly, as he took the offered chair, but kept his eyes still upon Cheeseman's; “but among that little is a bond from you, given nearly twenty years agone, and of which you will retain, no doubt, a vivid recollection.” “A bond, sir--a bond!” exclaimed the other, with his bright eyes twinkling, as in some business enterprise. “I never signed a bond in all my life, sir. Why, a bond requires sureties, and nobody ever went surety for me.”