Grif came in. He pushed, with some difficulty, the stiff bolt back into its socket, and begged pardon. This lady seemed to him quite beautiful, with a sort of autumnal sweetness in her face. He thought she must be rather old, certainly a good deal older than either Aunt Caroline or his mother. She was dressed in black, with black lace mittens on her wrists. Her thin hair, not so much white as colourless, was parted in the middle and smoothed closely down on either side of her forehead. She wore a cap of soft white lace with a lilac ribbon in it. Grif stammered out an explanation of his intrusion and hastily pulled up his stocking; but the lady only laughed and waved a pair of scissors at him. “I won’t allow you to catch butterflies here:――if they were caterpillars, that would be another matter. How would you like to hunt for ripe gooseberries instead? Those are the earliest bushes near the wall.” A tabby cat, with a tail standing up straight and stiff as a poker, stepped down the mossy path and rubbed itself against Grif’s legs. Then, jumping on to a bench and from that on to his shoulder, it pushed its face against his cheek, purring loudly, and pulling at his jacket with affectionate claws, as it passed from one shoulder to the other, pressing its warm body caressingly against the back of his head and neck. Thus accompanied, Grif began his search among the gooseberry-bushes. He had been busy for five minutes or so, and――being not so very particular as to ripeness――quite successfully, when he heard a heavy step on the cinder path, and a deep voice asking, “Who may our young friend be?” He thought at first the question was addressed to himself, and looked up quickly; but it was the lady who replied. “I’m afraid I haven’t been properly introduced. He is lunching with us, however, and I dare say he will tell us then.” Grif did not know whether he ought to join in this conversation. The mention of lunch recalled to him the fact that dinner was at two o’clock, and that he ought to be getting home. The old gentleman with the deep voice had evidently been gardening, for he held a basket in one hand and a pruning-knife in the other. Like Grif, he was bareheaded. His hair was white and fluffy, his face very red, and his eyes very blue. Also he was dressed in the oddest of clothes. When Grif, stepping out from the gooseberry-bushes, asked him politely what time it was, he produced a huge silver watch, hauling it out of the depths of an immense pocket, like an anchor at the end of a chain. “Lunch-time――lunch-time――half-past-one. You’d better come in and wash your paws. I can see you’ve travelled far and by difficult ways this morning.” “I’ve really only travelled from grandpapa’s,” said Grif. “Ah! from grandpapa’s.” “Grandpapa is Canon Annesley. I am Grif Weston, and we only arrived yesterday. We are going to stay all summer though.”