Basil and Annette. Farjeon Benjamin Leopold

they re-entered the store, and settled down to their game of cards.

      "Stop here a moment," said Newman Chaytor to Basil. "I'll get a light."

      Returning with a candle stuck in a bottle, the fashionable form of candlestick in Gum Flat, he waved it about, sometimes so close to Basil that it shone upon his features.

      "You stare at me," said Basil, "as if you knew me."

      "Never saw you before to my knowledge." (A falsehood, but that is a detail.) "You're not a colonial."

      "I am an Englishman, like yourself, I judge."

      "Yes, I am English."

      "You have the advantage of me-you know my name. May I ask yours?"

      "Certainly," said Chaytor, but he spoke, nevertheless, with a certain hesitation, as if something of importance hung upon it. "My name is Newman, with Chaytor tacked to it." Then, anxiously, "Have you heard it before?"

      "Never. This is a tumble-down place. It is a courtesy to call it a stable."

      "It will serve, in place of a better."

      "Oh, yes, it is better than nothing."

      "Everything is tumble-down in Gum Flat. I am an Englishman town-bred. And you?"

      "My people hail from Devonshire."

      "I am not dreaming, then," said Chaytor, speaking for the second time involuntarily.

      "Dreaming!" exclaimed Basil.

      "I was thinking of another matter," said Chaytor, with readiness. "Speaking my thoughts aloud is one of my bad tricks."

      "One of mine, too," said Basil smiling.

      "That is not the only thing in which we're alike."

      "No."

      "We are about the same age, about the same build, and we are both gentlemen. Your horse is blown; you have ridden a long distance."

      "From Bidaud's plantation."

      "I have heard of it. And you come upon business? I may be able to assist you."

      "I shall be glad of assistance," said Basil, recognising in his companion an obvious superiority to the men they had left. "When I passed through Gum Flat a few months ago I thought it a township likely to thrive, and now I find it pretty well deserted."

      "It has gone to the dogs, as I told you. There's nothing but grass for your horse to nibble at. So you're from Devonshire. Do your people live there still?"

      He mixed up the subjects of his remarks in the oddest manner, and cast furtive glances at Basil with a certain mental preoccupation which would have forced itself upon Basil's attention had he not been so occupied with his own special cares.

      "There are none left," said Basil. "I am the only one remaining."

      "The only one?"

      "Well, I have an old uncle, but we are not exactly on amicable terms."

      "You are better off than I am. I have no family left." He sighed pathetically. "I fancy I can lay my hands on a bundle of sweet hay."

      "I should feel grateful."

      "Don't leave the stable till I come back; I shan't be gone long."

      He was absent ten minutes or so and though he went straight about his errand, he was thinking of something very different. "It is the most wonderful thing in the world," ran his thoughts-"that I should meet him here again, in this hole, not changed in the slightest! It can't be accident; it was predestined, and I should be a self-confessed idiot if I did not take advantage of it. But how is it to be worked? His uncle is still alive. What did he say? 'We are not exactly on amicable terms.' That is because he is proud. I am not. I should be a better nephew to the old fellow than this upstart. He is very old, in his second childhood most likely. This is the turning-point of my life, and I will not throw away the chance. Just as I was at the bottom of the ladder, too. I'll climb to the top-I will, I will!" He raised his hand to the skies, as though registering an oath.

      "There," he said, throwing down a bundle of hay which the horse immediately began to munch, "with a bucket of water your mare will do very well. I'll fetch it."

      "You are very kind," said Basil, warming to Newman Chaytor.

      "Not at all. Noblesse oblige." This was said with a grand air.

      Basil held out his hand, and Chaytor pressed it effusively. Then, at Chaytor's request, Basil spoke of the errand upon which he was engaged, and being plied skilfully with questions, put his companion in possession of a great deal he wished to know, not only in relation to the affairs of Bidaud's plantation, but his own personal history as well.

      "It is curious," said Chaytor, "that we two should have met at such a time and in such a place. Who knows what may come of it? I am, strange to say, a bit of a doctor and a bit of a lawyer, and if you will accept my services I shall be glad to accompany you back to Bidaud's plantation."

      "But why?" asked Basil, touched by the apparently unselfish offer. "I have no claim upon you."

      "Except the claim that one gentleman has upon another-which should count for something. It always has with me."

      "Upon my word I don't know how to thank you."

      "Don't try. It is myself I am rendering a service to, not you. This deserted hole, and the association of those men" – jerking his thumb over his shoulder in the direction of the tent-"sicken me. Does there not come to some men a crisis in their lives which compels them to turn over a new leaf, as the saying is, to cut themselves away entirely from the past and commence life anew?"

      "Yes," said Basil, struck by the application of this figure of speech to his own circumstances, "it has come to me."

      "And to me. I intended to leave Gum Flat to-morrow, and I did not know in which direction. I felt like Robinson Crusoe on the desert island, without a friend, without a kindred soul to talk to, to associate with. If you will allow me to look upon you as a friend you will put me under a deep obligation. Should the brother of the poor gentleman who died so suddenly this morning-the father of that sweet young lady of whom you speak so tenderly-succeed in having things all his own way, you will be cast adrift, as I am. It is best to look things straight in the face, is it not? – even unpleasant things."

      "It is the most sensible course," said Basil.

      "Exactly. The most sensible course-and the most manly. Why should not you and I throw in our fortunes together? I am sure we should suit each other."

      "I can but thank you," said Basil. "It is worth thinking over."

      "All right; there is plenty of time before us. Let us go into the store now. A word of warning first. The men inside are not to be trusted. I was thrown into their company against my will, and I felt that the association was degrading to me. We can't pick and choose in this part of the world."

      "Indeed we cannot. I will not forget your warning. To speak honestly, I am not in the mood or condition for society. I have had a hard day, and am dead beat."

      "You would like to turn in," said Chaytor. "I can give you a shakedown, and for supper what remains of a tin of biscuits and a tin of sardines. There, don't say a word. The luck's on my side. Come along."

      The Nonentities and Jim the Hatter were in the midst of a wrangle when they entered, and scarcely noticed them. This left Chaytor free to attend to Basil. He placed before him the biscuits and sardines, and produced a flask of brandy. Basil was grateful for the refreshment; he was thoroughly exhausted, and it renewed his strength and revived his drooping spirits. Then he filled his pipe, and conversed in low tones with his new friend, while the gamblers continued their game.

      "If I stop up much longer," said Basil, when he had had his smoke, "I shall drop off my seat."

      Chaytor rose and preceded him to the further end of the store. The building, if such a designation may be allowed to an erection composed of only wood and canvas, had been the most pretentious and imposing in the palmy days of the township, and although now it was all tattered and torn, like the man in the nursery rhyme, it could still boast of half a dozen private compartments in which