“What do you mean?” he said point-blank. “Have you never heard the old tradition that as many times as a clergyman sounds the bell at his induction, so many years will he remain in the living? And the report in Claversham is that you rang it only once.” “You did not hear it yourself?” he said, catching her eyes suddenly, a lurking smile in his own. Her color rose faintly. “I am not sure,” she said. Then, meeting his eyes boldly, she added in a different tone, “Yes, I did hear it.” “Only once?” She nodded. “Oh, that is sad,” he answered. “Well, the tradition is new to me. If I had known it,” he added, laughing, “I should have tolled the bell at least fifty times. Clode should have instructed me; but I suppose he thought I knew. I remember now that the archdeacon did say something afterward, but I did not understand the reference. You know the archdeacon, Miss Bonamy, I suppose?” “No,” said Kate, growing stiff again. “Do you not? Well, at any rate you can tell me where Mrs. Hammond lives. She has kindly asked me to dine with her on Tuesday. I put my acceptance in my pocket, and thought I would deliver it myself when I came back from my walk.” “Mrs. Hammond lives at the Town House,” Kate answered. “It is the large house among the trees by the top of the town. You cannot mistake it.” “Shall I have the pleasure of meeting you there?” he asked, holding out his hand at last. “No; I do not know Mrs. Hammond,” Miss Bonamy said with decision. “Good-day, Mr. Lindo.” And she was gone; rather abruptly at last. “That is odd—very odd,” Lindo reflected as, continuing his walk, he turned to admire her graceful figure and the pretty carriage of her head. “I fancied that in these small towns every one knew every one. What sort of people are the Hammonds, I wonder? New, rich, and vulgar perhaps. It may be, and that would account for it. Yet Clode spoke highly of them.” Something which he did not understand in the girl’s manner continued to pique the young man’s curiosity after he had parted from her, and led him to dwell more intently upon her than upon the scenery, novel as this was to him. She had shown herself at one moment so frank, and at another so stiff and constrained, that it was equally impossible to ascribe the one attitude to shyness or the other to a naturally candid manner. The rector considered the question so long, and found it so puzzling—and interesting—that on his return to town he had come to one conclusion only—that it was his immediate duty to call upon his church wardens. He had made the acquaintance of Mr. Harper, his own warden, at his induction. It remained therefore to call upon Mr. Bonamy, the peoples’ warden. When he had taken his lunch, it seemed to him that there was no time like the present.