Wolf pulled himself up, and was for leaving with the usual unemotional jerk, but Lanty stood up, too, and held out his hand. Still, neither said anything, until the old man, going, spoke up suddenly, playing the game to the last, even as Harriet had tried to play it, posing to hide a wounded heart. “Yon fodder-gang, sir, as I mentioned? The old one’s as near done as may be. You’ll happen think it over----?” He broke off then, reality gripping him, and Lanty, biting his lip, said “I’ll see to it, Wolf!” and turned to the window. Brack laughed callously as the door closed. “What’s the old boy so almighty stuck about? He’s through with Ninekyrkes to-day, isn’t he? Mighty sick, I should say, and feeling kind of ‘’Way down upon the Swanee River’! A bit lost, too, from his talk. He’ll want precious little with fodder-gangs out at the Pride!” Lancaster said--“Grand weather for the time of year,” and handed him his receipt. The eyes of the two men met, Brack’s in a smiling half-sneer; and then he said “Champ!” turning, still smiling, to leave. “I’m not going to hustle you with ‘wants,’” he added kindly, “though I guess that doesn’t mean there’s nothing to ask! I reckon the only thing that would mend Thweng is a keg of gunpowder. But I’d just like to warn you to keep your boots well strutted. There’ll be powerful cold feet for somebody in March!” He swung out with his insolent smile, the last word successfully arresting an impulse that would have sent him spinning into the road. “March!” So Brack had evidently been behind Ezekiel, as conjectured. But why March? What was at the back of it all? And what did he think was coming? Denny burst in just afterwards and dispelled his wonderings, full of joy about the mangold, and anxious to know if Mr. Lancaster had seen it. His rollicking vitality swept the air clean both of regret and apprehension, so that, by the time Lanty took his seat at dinner, the surprising touch of jealousy evoked by Wiggie’s request was his only aftermath of the morning. The singer was on his left, with a very well-brushed Stubbs beside him, and Michael Dockeray opposite. At the head, Bluecaster, not quite certain that he wasn’t still in Cairo, had Willie Holliday, as chief tenant, on one hand, and Wolf on the other. The last was Dockeray’s place by right, but Bluecaster had contrived to remember the special circumstances and to whisper a word in Michael’s ear. The right waived, he called to Wolf, and the little attention brightened the old man considerably. It was by acts like these that Bluecaster kept his hold on his people in spite of his long absences. His larger generosity came to them, tempered by reason, through his agent, but his little touches of consideration had the charm of personal courtesy, and were thereby kept in mind. Lancaster was the strong arm upon which they leaned, but his lordship had his own place in their hearts.