conspirators,' exclaimed Mr. Radnor.

'He informed me that Mrs. Burman has heard of the new mansion.'

'My place at Lakelands?'

Mr. Radnor's clear-water eyes hardened to stony as their vision ran along
the consequences of her having heard it.

'Earlier this time!' he added, thrummed on the table, and thumped with
knuckles. 'I make my stand at Lakelands for good! Nothing mortal moves
me!'

'That butler of hers--'

'Jarniman, you mean: he's her butler, yes, the scoundrel--h'm-pah!
Heaven forgive me! she's an honest woman at least; I wouldn't rob her of
her little: fifty-nine or sixty next September, fifteenth of the month!
with the constitution of a broken drug-bottle, poor soul! She hears
everything from Jarniman: he catches wind of everything. All foreseen,
Fenellan, foreseen. I have made my stand at Lakelands, and there's my
flag till it's hauled down over Victor Radnor. London kills Nataly as
well as Fredi--and me: that is--I can use the words to you--I get back to
primal innocence in the country. We all three have the feeling. You're
a man to understand. My beasts, and the wild flowers, hedge-banks, and
stars. Fredi's poetess will tell you. Quiet waters reflecting. I
should feel it in Paris as well, though they have nightingales in their
Bois. It's the rustic I want to bathe me; and I had the feeling at
school, biting at Horace. Well, this is my Sabine Farm, rather on a
larger scale, for the sake of friends. Come, and pure air, water from