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Now, Mr. James Conyers had exerted himself as much in order to overcome the cowardly objections of this rustic clown as he could have done if Steeve Hargraves had been the most accomplished body-servant in the three ridings. Perhaps there was some deeper motive than any regard for the man himself in this special preference for the softy; some lurking malice, some petty spite, the key to which was hidden in his own breast. If, while standing smoking in the village street, chaffing the softy for the edification of the lookers-on, and taking so much trouble to secure such an ignorant and brutish esquire — if one shadow of the future, so very near at hand, could have fallen across his path, surely he would have instinctively recoiled from the striking of that ill-omened bargain. But James Conyers had no superstition; indeed, he was so pleasantly free from that weakness as to be a disbeliever in all things in heaven and on earth, except himself and his own merits; so he hired the softy, for the fun of the thing, as he called it, and walked slowly back to the Park gates to watch for the return of Mr. and Mrs. Mellish, who were expected that afternoon. The woman at the lodge brought him out a chair, and begged him to rest himself under the portico. He thanked her with a pleasant smile, and sat down among the roses and honeysuckles, and lighted another cigar. “You’ll find the north lodge dull, I’m thinking, sir,” the woman said, from the open window, where she had reseated herself with her needle-work. “Well, it is n’t very lively, ma’am, certainly,” answered Mr. Conyers, “but it serves my purpose well enough.