"I've heard my mother speak of you," he said.
"But you don't remember what she said?"
"Not much, I'm afraid. It is very stupid of me. But that I have heard her speak of you I'm certain. I know your name well."
"There was nothing much to say. We were very good friends thirty years ago. Mrs. Harding might naturally mention my name if she were speaking of Mitchelhurst. Does she often talk of old days?"
"Not often. I shall tell her I met you."
Barbara stood by, wondering and interested, glancing to and fro as they spoke. At this moment she caught her uncle's eye.
"By the way," he said, "I have not introduced you to my niece—my great-niece, to be strictly accurate—Miss Barbara Strange."
Harding bowed ceremoniously, and yet with a touch of self-contemptuous amusement. He bowed, but he remembered that she had seen him slide down a muddy bank on his back by way of an earlier introduction.
"Mr. Rothwell Harding, I suppose I should say?" the old man inquired.
"No. I'm not named Rothwell. I'm Reynold Harding."