“I’m not so old, and I’m a lady,” replied Alma sharply. “And how long is it since you started picking and choosing your customers?” The man grumbled something under his breath, and without waiting even to display his wares, shuffled off along the dusty road, and they watched him until he was out of sight. Heavytree Farm was rather grandly named for so small a property. The little estate followed the road to Heavytree Lane, which formed the southern boundary of the property. The lane itself ran at an angle to behind the house, where the third boundary was formed by a hedge dividing the farmland from the more pretentious estate of a local magnate. It was down the lane the pedlar turned. “Excuse me, ma’am,” said the companion of the man with the pipe. He opened the gate, walked in, and, making a circuit of the house, reached the orchard behind. Here a few outhouses were scattered, and, clearing these, he came to the meadow, where Mirabelle’s one cow ruminated in the lazy manner of her kind. Half hidden by a thick-boled apple-tree, the watcher waited, and presently, as he expected, he saw a head appear through the boundary hedge. After an observation the pedlar sprang into the meadow and stood, taking stock of his ground. He had left his tray and his bag, and, running with surprising swiftness for a man of his age, he gained a little wooden barn, and, pulling open the door, disappeared into its interior. By this time the guard had been joined by his companion and they had a short consultation, the man with the pipe going back to his post before the house, whilst the other walked slowly across the meadow until he came to the closed door of the barn. Wise in his generation, he first made a circuit of the building, and discovered there were no exits through the blackened gates. Then, pulling both doors open wide: “Come out, bo’!” he said. The barn was empty, except for a heap of hay that lay in one corner and some old and wheelless farm-wagons propped up on three trestles awaiting the wheelwright’s attention. A ladder led to a loft, and the guard climbed slowly. His head was on a level with the dark opening, when: “Put up your hands!” He was looking into the adequate muzzle of an automatic pistol. “Come down, bo’!” “Put up your hands,” hissed the voice in the darkness, “or you’re a dead man!” The watcher obeyed, cursing his folly that he had come alone. “Now climb up.” With some difficulty the guard brought himself up to the floor level. “Step this way, and step lively,” said the pedlar. “Hold your hands out.” He felt the touch of cold steel on his wrist, heard a click. “Now the other hand.” The moment he was manacled, the pedlar began a rapid search. “Carry a gun, do you?” he sneered, as he drew a pistol from the man’s hip pocket. “Now sit down.”