The train went on, and Vane stood still, looking about him with a poignant recollection of how he had last waited on that platform, sick at heart, but gathering his youthful courage for the effort that he must make. It all came back to him; the dejection, the sense of loneliness; for he was then going out to the Western Dominion in which he had not a friend. Now he was returning prosperous and successful. But once again the feeling of loneliness was with him--most of those whom he had left behind had made a longer journey than his. Then he noticed an elderly man in livery approaching, and held out his hand with a smile of pleasure. "You haven't changed a bit, Jim," he said. "A bit stiffer in the joints, and maybe a bit sourer," was the answer; then the man's wrinkled face relaxed. "I'm main glad to see thee, Mr. Wallace. Master wad have come, only he'd t' gan t' Manchester suddenly." Vane helped him to place their baggage in the trap, and then, gathering up the reins, bade him sit behind. After half an hour's ride through a country rolled in ridge and valley, Vane pulled up where a stile path led across a strip of meadow. "You can drive round; we'll be there before you," he said to the groom as he got down. Carroll and he crossed the meadow, and passing round a clump of larches, came suddenly into sight of an old grey house with a fir wood rolling down the hillside close behind it. The building was long and low, weather-worn and stained with lichens where the creepers and climbing roses left the stone exposed. The bottom row of mullioned windows opened upon a terrace, and in front of the latter ran a low wall with a mossy coping on which was placed urns bright with geraniums. It was pierced by an opening approached by shallow stairs on which a peacock stood, and between them and the two men stretched a sweep of lawn. A couple of minutes later a lady met them in the hall, and held out her hand to Vane effusively. She was middle-aged, and had once been handsome, Carroll thought, but there were wrinkles about her eyes, which had a hint of hardness in them. "Welcome home, Wallace," she said. "It should not be difficult to look upon the Dene as that--you were here so often once upon a time." "Thank you," said Vane. "I felt tempted to ask Jim to drive me round by the Low Wood; I wanted to see the place again." "I'm glad you didn't," and the lady smiled sympathetically. "The house is shut up and going to pieces. It would have been depressing to-night." Vane presented Carroll. Mrs. Chisholm's manner was gracious; but for no particular reason Carroll wondered if she would have extended the same welcome to either, had his comrade not come back the discoverer of a mine. "Tom was sorry he couldn't wait to meet you, but he had to leave for Manchester on some urgent business," she informed Vane, and looked round as a girl with disordered hair came up to them. "This is Mabel," she said. "I hardly think you will remember her."