Seated beside this lad was a burly,
red-bearded man in respectable clothes, who, to judge
from the tin-box and travelling-bags fastened on behind,
seemed coming to High Thorpe to stay.
"Who on earth is that?" asked Thorpe, wonderingly.
The man was obviously of the lower class, yet there
seemed something about him which invited recognition.
"Presumably it's the new head-gardener," she replied
with brevity.
Her accent recalled to Thorpe the fact that there
had been something disagreeable in their conversation,
and the thought of it was unpleasant to him.
"Why, I didn't know you had a new man coming," he said,
turning to her with an overture of smiling interest.
"Yes," she answered, and then, as if weighing the proffered
propitiation and rejecting it, turned slowly and went
into the house.
The trap apparently ended its course at some back
entrance: he did not see it again. He strolled indoors,
after a little, and told his man to pack a bag for London,
and order the stanhope to take him to the train.
CHAPTER XXIII
IN the early morning, long before any of the hotel people
had made themselves heard moving about, Thorpe got up.
It was a long time since he had liked himself and his
surroundings so little. The bed seemed all right to the eye,
and even to the touch, but he had slept very badly in it,
none the less.
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