'By the way, have you ever heard aught of that unfortunate young gentleman?' asked the factor. 'What young gentleman?' said Hew, sulkily. 'Captain Falconer.' 'Oh! the singing woman's son--dancer, or whatever she was--no; how should I hear of him?' 'A pity--he must be found.' 'Found--for what?' asked Hew, growing pale, as he recalled the event of the ball. 'You'll have to seek him where he has gone.' 'And where is that?' 'The husks and the swine-trough--or the devil.' 'How can you speak so pitilessly?' 'I don't owe him much, I think,' muttered Hew; with an imprecation. 'God knows all you owe him.' 'How--why--in what way?' thundered Hew. 'As reparation.' 'D--n the fellow, I never wronged him!' exclaimed Hew, growing paler than ever, while his shifty eyes wandered restlessly about, and fear seized him that John Balderstone had discovered, he knew not what. But on this day the latter took all Hew's insolence of manner with wonderful equanimity, while his rubicund face seemed to beam and ripple all over with good-nature, and his eyes were twinkling as if he had something _in petto_ that greatly delighted him. 'Reparation,' growled Hew, scornfully; 'reparation for what?' 'Here comes the general; he will tell you all about it,' said the factor, as Sir Piers, in an old tweed suit, arrived from a morning's fishing, with rod in hand, a full basket, and a venerable wideawake hat, garnished all round with flies and catgut. 'Welcome, John; welcome, Balderstone! you have business with me? Step indoors. A glass of sherry and a biscuit before luncheon--tiffin, as we say in India--and then we'll hear all about it.' 'Business to which Mr. Hew may as well listen, as it interests him very nearly,' said Mr. Balderstone, with a sudden gravity of demeanour that impressed the former unpleasantly, and filled his heart with the alarm of the guilty, and he was the first to assist himself to a glass of the sherry which Tunley placed on the dining-room table; 'and as what I have to relate is not without interest to our dear Miss Mary,' added Mr. Balderstone, 'I would wish her to be present too.' 'Now what the devil can all this be about?' thought Hew, in a cold perspiration, as he took another glass of sherry, and thought of the ball and the court-martial that came of it, while Mary seated herself near Sir Piers, with her heart beating quickly and unequally, and her white hands trembling at her Berlin-wool work. 'In this matter I must begin at the beginning, as we used to read in the old story-books,' said Mr. Balderstone, polishing his bald head with his handkerchief, and looking up at the ceiling as if he would draw inspiration therefrom. 'Begin at the beginning!--don't say that,' said Sir Piers. 'Why, general?'