satisfaction. This would be a very proper attention from a
landlord about to leave the country.

When I reached Boynton I determined to walk to my house,
for I did not wish to encumber myself with a hired vehicle. I
might be asked to stay to luncheon. A very strange feeling came
over me as I entered my grounds. They were not mine. For the
time being they belonged to somebody else. I was merely a
visitor or a trespasser if the Vincents thought proper so to
consider me. If they did not like people to walk on the grass I
had no right to do it.

None of my servants had been left on the place, and the maid
who came to the door informed me that Mr. Vincent had gone to New
York that morning, and that Mrs. Vincent and her daughter were
out driving. I ventured to ask if she thought they would soon
return, and she answered that she did not think they would, as
they had gone to Rock Lake, which, from the way they talked about
it, must be a long way off.

Rock Lake! When I had driven over there with my friends, we
had taken luncheon at the inn and returned in the afternoon. And
what did they know of Rock Lake? Who had told them of it? That
officious Barker, of course.

"Will you leave a message, sir?" said the maid, who, of
course, did not know me.

"No," said I, and as I still stood gazing at the piazza
floor, she remarked that if I wished to call again she would go