Beatrice looked at him with a shiver. He wore a suit of clothes too large for him, a dirty red wisp round his lean throat, and carpet slippers bound with string to his large feet. He was of no great height, and his shock of red hair made him look even smaller. His face was clean-shaven, or rather it ought to have been, for apparently it had not been touched by a razor for quite a week. Twisting the straw in his mouth, and a ragged cricketing cap in his hairy hands, he straddled with his short legs and leered impudently. It was the animal eyes of the man that made Beatrice shiver: they were green and shallow, like those of a bird, and the expression in them was evil in the extreme. The creature evidently had been steeped in iniquity from his cradle, and the foulness of his presence marred the perfect beauty of that still garden sleeping in the sunshine, so clean and wholesome. "What do you want?" asked Miss Hedge sharply and shortly. "I wos jest atellin' y'," said Waterloo--as he called himself--and his voice rasped like a file. "I wants t'see Mr. Paslow." "He is in town," snapped Mrs. Lilly, surveying the creature with still deeper disgust. "Have you a message for him?" Waterloo laid a warty finger on one side of his pug nose, and winked in a horribly familiar manner. "Thet's tellin's," said he, grinning, "an' not evin' to th' sect I'm so fond of, does I give myself away. Oh no, not at all, by no means, you dear things." "Go away," cried Beatrice, putting her handkerchief to her nose, for the atmosphere was tainted by the presence of the man; "if you don't, I'll call Durban." This was a happy inspiration, as she knew that Durban was on the premises. The man's eyes flashed still more wickedly. "Ho, yuss! by all means, miss. Call 'im, and you'll see wot you'll see." He spat out the straw, and produced a black pipe, which he stuck in his mouth. "I kin wyte." "You'll be ducked in the horse-pond, you beast," said Mrs. Lilly, growing red with anger. "I'll hand you over to the police, and----" "Durban! Durban!" called out Beatrice, who caught a glimpse of the servant round the corner of the terrace, and at once he came running down the steps. "Who is this man, Durban?" "How dare you come here?" said Durban, advancing threateningly on the small man, who cringed and whined. "You were told not to come here at least a dozen times." "Lor'!" whimpered the little man, now subdued and servile; "wot a fuss you do meke, Mr. Durban, sir. I come fur Mr. Paslow, I does." "Send him away, Durban," cried Beatrice with great disgust. Durban lifted one finger, and at once the tramp went slinking away like a dog with its tail between its legs. And like a dog he halted at the hedge which divided the drive from the garden, and showed his teeth in an evil snarl. Beatrice could see the flash of white, and could guess that he was snapping like a mad cur. "Who on earth is that?" she asked Durban, when the man finally disappeared behind the hedge.