I would have liked to ask the maid some questions, but she was an elderly woman, who looked as if she might be the mother of the lemon-juice boy, and as she said not a word to me while she made a few arrangements in the room, I did not feel emboldened to say anything to her.

When I left my room and went out on the little porch, I soon came to the conclusion that this was not a house of great resort.  I saw nobody in front and I heard nobody within.  There seemed to be an air of quiet greenness about the surroundings, and the little porch was a charming place in which to sit and look upon the evening landscape.

After a time the boy came to tell me that supper was ready.  He did so as if he were informing me that it was time to take medicine and he had just taken his.

Supper awaited me in a very pleasant room, through the open windows of which there came a gentle breeze which made me know that there was a flower-garden not far away.  The table was a small one, round, and on it there was supper for one person.  I seated myself, and the elderly woman waited on me.  I was so grateful that the boy was not my attendant that my heart warmed towards her, and I thought she might not consider it much out of the way if I said something.

“Did I arrive after the regular supper-time?” I asked.  “I am sorry if I put the establishment to any inconvenience.”

“What’s inconvenience in your own house isn’t anything of the kind in a tavern,” she said.  “We’re used to that.  But it doesn’t matter to-day.  You’re the only transient; that is, that eats here,” she added.

I wanted very much to ask something about the lady who had gone to school in Walford, but I thought it would be well to approach that subject by degrees.

“Apparently,” said I, “your house is not full.”

“No,” said she, “not at this precise moment of time.  Do you want some more tea?”

The tone in which she said this made me feel sure she was the mother of the boy, and when she had given me the tea, and looked around in a general way to see that I was provided with what else I needed, she left the room.

After supper I looked into the large room where I had registered; it was lighted, and was very comfortably furnished with easy-chairs and a lounge, but it was an extremely lonely place, and, lighting a cigar, I went out for a walk.  It was truly a beautiful country, and, illumined by the sunset sky, with all its forms and colors softened by the growing dusk, it was more charming to me than it had been by daylight.

As I returned to the inn I noticed a man standing at the entrance of a driveway which appeared to lead back to the stable-yards.  “Here is some one who may talk,” I thought, and I stopped.

[Illustration:  “Went out for A walk”]

“This ought to be a good country for sport,” I said—­“fishing, and that sort of thing.”