"Yes, all the time. Have you never met him before? Yet, how should you? He lives in the New Forest, and communes with birds and animals. People think he is mad, but he is the sanest person I know." "Why?" asked she. "Because he has had the wit to find out what he likes, and to do it all the time." "And what is that?" asked the girl. "He sits by a stream and looks at the water. Then he lies on his back and looks at the sky. Then he whistles, chuckles, what you please to call it, and the thrushes come scudding out of the bushes and chuckle back at him." "Is that not rather uncanny?" asked Madge. "Most uncanny. Some day, as I tell him, he will see Pan. And I shall then have to attend a funeral." The girl's eyebrows wrinkled into a frown. "Pan?" she said. "Yes; he is the God of 'Go as you please!' And his temple is a lunatic asylum. But don't be alarmed. The Hermit won't go into a lunatic asylum yet awhile." "The Hermit?" "Yes, the Hermit is Merivale. Because he lives quite alone in the New Forest. He never reads, he hardly ever sees anybody, he never does anything. He used to write at one time." Madge shivered slightly. "How intensely uncomfortable!" she said. "I think I shall like Mr. Dundas best." "You are sure to like him." "Because everybody does? That is the worst of reasons. I always distrust very popular people." "The judgment of the world is usually wrong, you mean. But occasionally one stumbles on an exception." The four had turned back towards the house, and as Philip spoke, he and his companion gained the top step of the gravelled square bordered by flower-beds, where he had sat two hours ago with his mother. The shadow of the house had swung over it, and in the gathering dusk the flower-beds glowed with a dim subaqueous radiance. Philip's mother and Lady Ellington had already passed into the open French window of the drawing-room, but on the stout balustrade of the terrace there sat a young man. One long slim leg rested on the gravel, the other was crooked round the lead vase at the head of the steps. His face, extraordinarily boyish, was clean-shaven, or rather so boyish was it, that it looked as if it was still untouched by razor. He held a cigarette in one hand, and the other, long-fingered and white as a woman's, grasped his knee. "Oh, Philip!" he cried; "how are you? Oddly enough, I am quite well. I always was, like Sydney Smith and his great coat. Isn't there time for a game of croquet before dinner? Let's all be late, and so we shall all be punctual; it is only a question of degree. Miss Ellington, do come and play. Why did the barmaid champagne, and--oh, I asked you that. Stout, porter is rather good though. I do believe you know it, Philip." [Illustration: text decoration] SECOND