Harry asked how it was to be made to pay. Lowndes had every detail at his finger-ends, and sketched out an amazing programme with bewildering volubility. The price of salmon would be reduced a hundred per cent. The London shops would take none but the Company's fish. Fresh trout would sell like herrings in the street, and the Company would buy up the fishmongers' shops all over the country, just as brewers bought up public-houses. As soon as possible they would have their own line to the North, and expresses full of nothing but fish would do the distance without stopping in time hitherto unprecedented in railway annals. "But," said Harry, "there are plenty of fish in the sea, and in other places besides the Highlands." "So there are, but in ten years' time we shall own every river in the kingdom, and every cod-bank round the coast." "And where will the crofters come in then?" Lowndes roared with laughter. "They won't come in at all. It will be forgotten that they ever were in: the original Company will probably be incorporated with the British Fresh Water and Deep Sea Fishing Company, Limited. Capital ten millions. General Manager, Sir Gordon Lowndes, Bart., Park Lane, W. Secretary, H. Ringrose, Esq., at the Company's Offices, Trafalgar Square. We shall buy up the Grand Hotel and have them there. As for the crofters, they'll be our Empire and our Gospel; we'll play them for all they're worth in the first year or two, and then we'll let them slide." Miss Lowndes had been present all this time, and Harry had stolen more than one anxious glance in her direction. She never put in a word, nor could she be said to wear her thoughts upon her face, as she bent it over some needlework in the corner where she sat. Yet it was the daughter's silent presence which kept Harry himself proof for once against the always contagious enthusiasm of the father. He could not help coupling it with other silences of the early evening, and the Highland Crofters' Salmon and Trout Supply Association, Limited, left him as cold as he felt certain it left Miss Lowndes. It was now after eleven, however, and he rose to bid her good-night, while Lowndes went to get his hat in order to escort him to the station. "And I shall never forget our walk," added Harry, and unconsciously wrung her hand as though it were that of some new-found friend of his own sex. "Then don't forget my advice," said Miss Lowndes, "but write--write--write--and come and tell me how you get on!" It was her last word to him, and for days to come it stimulated Harry Ringrose, like many another remembered saying of this new friend, whenever he thought of it. But at the time he was most struck by her tacit dismissal of the more brilliant prospects which had been discussed in her hearing. "A fine creature, my daughter," said Lowndes, on the way to the station. "She's one to stand by a fellow in the day of battle--she's as staunch as steel." "I can see it," Harry answered, with enthusiasm.