“You will pardon me. I can’t undertake to travel with that passport, even if countersigned by you.” “Sir, sir! Whither are you bound? Do you think the chub are interested in your converse?” “I don’t know. The wise man baits his hook with inquiry.” “And the fool his with impertinence. You fish in empty waters, sir.” “Oh! You are churlish. But I understand an angler sports for the love of solitude.” “You are perfectly right.” “Well--convince me that I have not wandered abroad, and I will go.” “You are out of your path here. That I can assert.” “For ‘Delsrop’ House?” The long man’s fist jerked, so that his float bobbed on the water. “For where?” said he. The float slid out of sight. Mechanically he reeled up, bungled, and lost his fish. Curiously, he seemed little affected by the calamity. “What place?” he repeated, busy with his hook. “‘Delsrop,’ ’tis called--a house somewhere in the neighbourhood.” “Why, what d’ye seek thither?” “Surely, sir, you are a fool by your own showing. Rest content. I only seek my own.” “Your own--‘Delsrop?’” Mr. Tuke sniggered with amusement. “Preserve the man!” he cried. “But I understand, sir; and appreciate the kind of welcome like to be extended to an absentee landlord.” For a moment the stranger seemed at a loss for speech. Then suddenly he turned upon the other, with a strained smile on his lips and his nostrils in a lively state of convulsion. “You must pardon me,” he said. “I know the house, which hath been so long untenanted, that the fact of a claimant to its wildernesses appearing fills me with a sense of the abnormal.” He trailed his rod, staring at the intruder. “So you own ‘Delsrop?’” said he, with a musing hand caressing his stubble. “I suppose you know--now I suppose you know the place is reputed to be haunted?” Mr. Tuke was growing impatient. “Can you direct me thither?” he said curtly. “Surely, sir,”--a lean smile creased the leathery skin of his cheeks. “You have only to follow the road you left. Over the crest of the first slope you will pass a tavern--the ‘Dog and Duck.’ The gates of ‘Delsrop’ break a plantation of firs, three miles beyond.” The baronet expressed his thanks briefly, and stalked away. His informant looked an unsavoury piece of goods, in all truth, and he was growing conscious of a sense of weariness that inclined him to resent undue eccentricity. He remounted his horse, and pricked him to the ascent beyond the dip. Looking back as he neared the top, he noticed that the fisherman was disjointing his rod with a snapping, impatient hurry of action that seemed to signify his sport was no longer the uppermost interest with him. “I am destined to be stalked for some weeks as a black swan,” thought he crossly. “My advent will be better than a raree-show to these local blockheads.”