There was not much to tell, but it was to the following effect. It dated from the evening when he had been left busying himself in the garden of old Tummus’s cottage, left entirely to himself, trimming up the roses, and thinking sadly that there was no future for him in the world.
This had been going on for some time, and he was busily feeling the prickly rose strands, and taking nails and shreds from his pocket to tack the wild, blossoming shoots neatly in their places, in perfect ignorance, after a while, that he was being watched. For, though he heard hoofs upon the hard green turf beside the road, he supposed the sounds to be made by some horse returning to its stables from its pasture on the common, and did not imagine that it was mounted, as he heard it stop, and begin cropping the young shoots upon the garden hedge.
“Good-evening,” said a decisive voice suddenly, speaking as if it was a good evening, and he who spoke would like to hear any one contradict him.
“Good-evening, sir,” replied John Grange, adding the “sir,” for the voice seemed familiar, and he knew the speaker was riding.
“You remember me, eh?”
There was a slight twitching about the muscles of John Grange’s forehead as he craned his neck towards the speaker, and then he seemed to draw back, as he said sadly—
“No, sir; I seem to remember your voice, but I am blind.”
“Quite blind?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Look in my direction—hard, and now tell me: can you not make out my face, even faintly?”