Roy was not allowed to go to the Rectory the next morning as it was rather damp, and nurse was carefully trying to ward off a bronchial attack, but he was permitted to see Rob, and the latter came in looking rather sheepish and as if he did not know what to do with his hands and his feet.
"What are you going to do, Rob?" asked Roy, eagerly, after their first greetings had been exchanged; "you aren't going home again?"
"I'd sooner be shot," was the short reply.
"I've been talking to Aunt Judy about you again this morning, and she says if you would like to help our old gardener in the garden and could get a character from some one, she'd try you. I don't quite know what she means about the character. I thought that belonged to you and not to any one else. She says she doesn't know what you're like, but I told her I'd find out. I say, take a chair, won't you. Now then, you don't mind my asking you a few questions, do you? Are you a thief?"
Rob took the chair that was offered him, squared his shoulders, and looked up with a pleasant smile at this blunt question.
"No, I ain't that."
"Have you ever killed anybody?"
"No."
"Are you a drunkard?"
"I hate the stuff!"