“I stayed up Arroyo way over Sunday. Mrs. George Thorburn spoke of you, and asked me to bring you a letter and--and back it up.” He took an envelope from a pocket, rose and handed it across the table. “Really, I _hope_ you’ll go.” His voice was deep with earnestness. He honoured Austin Knowles,--and pitied him; for he knew how rare had been the other’s devotion to the wife now seven years dead, how sincere was his mourning for her, and how lonely was his life in that big stone house on the avenue. “I’m going up again for the rest of my vacation,” Heaton continued. “And I’ll look for you.” He held out his hand. The elder man took it. “Perhaps,” he said absent-mindedly. And Heaton passed out. It was a crested letter, perfumed, and written in a large, modishly angular hand. Mrs. Thorburn’s invitation was cordial, even pressing. She wrote that the hills were simply lovely now, and that she just knew her dear Mr. Knowles was awfully fagged. So she wanted above all things that he should have a fortnight’s vacation at High Court. “Dorothy will be home,” she went on to say, “and some charming people are visiting me. You will find your stay restful, I am sure, for you shall do as you choose--except at dinner-time--and read or ride or ramble the days away. Dear Mr. Knowles, do come.” “Restful”--his thoughts dwelt upon that word. He leaned back, covering his eyes. These seven years he had given himself no time for anything save work--hard, persistent work that had kept him from despair. But it had worn him down. His face had thinned, his hair grown grey at the temples, his shoulders rounded, his step become less elastic. Rest--he needed it. And “to read or ride or ramble” held a promise of pleasure and recuperation. He lifted his head presently and touched a bell. It was answered by the man-servant, young and soft of foot, who approached, as Heaton had, with an air at once respectful and anxiously inquiring. “Did you ring, sir?” “Yes, Thomas. I’m going out of town for a couple of weeks. Pack what I’ll need--right off.” A moment ago, he had wavered over deciding. Now, of a sudden, and almost unaccountably, as though roused by a sense of coming freedom, Austin was all eagerness to get away from the lonely house, the wearing office, the noisy town. “Will you want me to go with you, sir?” “No,--no, I think not. You may have two weeks for yourself. Send this wire.” He scribbled a few words hastily, then rose. “Mr. Knowles,--please.” Thomas, having received the telegram, was halted irresolutely at the door. “If I may ask, sir, if--if you’d object----” “What, Thomas?” Austin turned, smiling encouragement. “I’d--I’d--like to get married, sir, while you’re gone. I’d be settled and ready for my duties when you came back. It’s a young lady I’ve known a good while, sir, and we could rent that little cottage just back of here--the one with the nasturtiums over the porch. Maybe you recall it, sir.”