The old man looked like a wizened monkey as he screwed up his eyes and chuckled. He was in a good temper this morning--good for him--and he looked well pleased as his eye traveled slowly over the wonderful expanse of garden which lay spread out like a fairy panorama below his window. "Give me those field-glasses," he commanded sharply, "and then you can get about your business. Those maids downstairs will be wasting their time while you're up here." "What will you take for luncheon to-day, sir?" "Woman, I left enough chicken yesterday to feed a family. The chicken curried, and don't forget the chutney." Then, after a mumbling interval, "and, if anybody calls, I won't see 'em--except Notley, who comes at eleven. And, when he comes, send him up at once--no kitchen gossip! I don't pay lawyers to come here and amuse kitchen wenches. Why don't you speak, eh? W-what?" "Because I've nothing to say, sir." "That's right, that's right. Now that you've left off 'speaking your mind,' as you used to call it, you're becoming quite docile and useful. Perhaps, I'll give Ripon another fifty dollars a year. I'm not a hard man, you know, when people understand that I stand no nonsense. But I always have my own way. No one can get over me. You and I understand each other, Mrs. Ripon, eh? Yet, I doubt if you'd have remained so long, if Ripon hadn't married you. He's made a sensible woman of you. Tell him I'm going to give him an extra fifty dollars a year, but--but he must do with a hand less in the gardens." "What, another?" "Yes. It'll pay, won't it, to get fifty dollars a year more, and save me two hundred on the outdoor staff, eh?" The woman made no answer, but crossed the room softly, and closed the door. When she was on the other side of it, she shook her fist at him. "You old wretch! If I had my way, I'd smother you. You spoil your own life, and you're spoiling my man. He won't be fit to live with soon." The sunlight streamed into the bedroom, and Herresford, drawing the curtains of his ebony bedstead, lay blinking in their shadow, looking out over his garden, and noting every beauty with the keen pleasure of an ardent lover of horticulture--his only hobby. As advancing age laid its finger more heavily upon him, he had become increasingly irritable and impossible. Every human instinct seemed to have shriveled up and died--all save the love of money and his passion for flowers. His withered old lips almost smiled as he moved the field-glasses slowly, bringing into range the magnificent stretch of soft turf, with its patchwork of vivid color.