Might there have troubled him some vague, secret feeling of association between himself and that brown, massive front of Burdon House with its broad steps leading to the heavy double doors, with its tall, wrought-iron railings above the area, with its old torch extinguishers on either side the entrance, with its quiet, impassive air that large old houses have, as of guardians that know much and have seen much--brides come and coffins go, birth and death, gay nights and sad, glad hours and sorry--and look to know more and see more? Might he have felt, as he told Aunt Maggie he had felt at Burdon Old Manor, "thinking without thinking, as if some one else were thinking," as he passed those steps where one that he might have called Father often had gaily passed, where one he might have called Mother had gone wearily up and come fainting, dizzily down? He felt, nor was disturbed, by none of those. He only gazed, gazed as he would pierce them, at all its solemn windows, riveted its every feature on his mind; but only because it was where she must have looked, because it sheltered her where she must be. It was a new setting against which he might envisage her; he only thought of it as that. CHAPTER XIII MR. AMBER DOES NOT RECOGNISE I It was in dreams that night that vague, secret influences of his sight of Burdon House came stealing about him--if such they were; he attributed them to the disturbance of an event that greeted him within a few hours of his gay arrival at "Post Offic." He had announced his coming by telegram. He took Plowman's Ridge on leaving the train at Great Letham, old friend wind greeting him with most boisterous Ha! Ha! Ha! and as he came down the slope two figures broke from the little copse and came fluttering up the Downside towards him--one slight with running tears, and outstretched, eager arms; the other gaunt and grim, uncompromising of visage, but with eyes aglisten. "Aunt Maggie! Aunt Maggie!" "My boy! My Percival!" Her boy's arms went about her: for a space neither moved after that first cry. He only held her--close, close to him; she only clung to him, her face to his, and felt his dear face stop her flowing tears. He held her from him then at arm's length, the better to gaze at her; and she overcame her foolish tears and told him: "How you have grown! How handsome you have grown!" And Honor grimly, with grimness spoilt by chokey utterance: "Ah, handsome is as handsome don't make fine birds!" "You've got it wrong, you frightful old goose!" cried Percival; and there was Honor's bony cheek to be kissed, her bony hug to take. Then the disturbing even:-- Mr. Amber, Aunt Maggie told him, was dying. He had been told Percival was coming and had begged to see him. There had only been a brief interval of consciousness in the last twenty-four hours; Percival had better go at once. II