After a couple of hours in the Row the party returned to Mrs. Wilmslow's, where Emily bade them farewell, and Prescott also alighted, giving up his horse to the groom waiting for it. Kate Mellon saw her other pupils to their home close by, and then turned into the Row again, intending to have one final gallop on her way to The Den. She was at full speed when she heard the dull thud of a horse's hoofs close behind her, and turning saw Mr. Simnel. In a minute he was by her side.
"How d'ye do, Kate?" said he, reining-in his big hunter; "I came on the chance of seeing you here."
"How do, Simnel?" said Miss Mellon, shortly; "what do you want?"
"I want you to say when I can come up to The Den and have half-an-hour's chat with you, Kate."
"And I tell you, never! as I've told you before. Look here, Simnel," said she, pulling up short; "let's have this out now. I don't like you; I never did, and I never shall! and I don't want you at my place. Do you understand?"
"Perfectly," said Simnel, with a hard smile; "and yet I think I must come. I want to say something specially particular to you."
"What about? What you've said before? About yourself?"
"No," said Simnel, smiling as before; "I never say things twice over. I want to talk to you about a friend of ours--Charles Beresford."
"Charles Beresford?--what of him?"
"That's just what I propose to come and tell you."