The speaker was a man in a smock-frock, passing with a reaping-hook on
his shoulder. Mr. Elster's sunny face and cheery voice gave back the
salutation with tenfold heartiness, smiling at the title. Half the
peasantry had been used to addressing the brothers so, indiscriminately;
they were all lords to them.

The interruption awoke Mr. Elster from his thoughts, and he marched gaily
on down the middle of the road, noting its familiar features. The small
shops were on his right hand, the line of rails behind them. A few white
villas lay scattered on his left, and beyond them, but not to be seen
from this village street, wound the river; both running parallel with the
village lying between them. Soon the houses ceased; it was a small place
at best; and after an open space came the church. It lay on his right, a
little way back from the road, and surrounded by a large churchyard.
Almost opposite, on the other side of the road, but much further back,
was a handsome modern white house; its delightful gardens sloping almost
to the river. This was the residence of the Rector, Dr. Ashton, a wealthy
man and a church dignitary, prebendary and sub-dean of Garchester
Cathedral. Percival Elster looked at it yearningly, if haply he might see
there the face of one he loved well; but the blinds were drawn, and the
inmates were no doubt steeped in repose.

"If she only knew I was here!" he fondly aspirated.

On again a few steps, and a slight turn in the road brought him to a
small red-brick house on the same side as the church, with green shutters
attached to its lower windows. It lay in the midst of a garden well
stocked with vegetables, fruit, and the more ordinary and brighter
garden-flowers. A straight path led to the well-kept house-door, its