He took up the paper and skimmed a column or two. Presently he looked from behind it, and their eyes met.
"I can't help thinking," he said, "that we have met before somewhere, haven't we? I don't know where, but I have an idea that your memory is better than mine."
The other was obviously taken by surprise.
"No," he said, drawing back and frowning. "No—in fact I'm sure we haven't met—at least not to my knowledge. My name is Harding."
Scarlett owned that the name conveyed nothing to his mind, but when in return he mentioned his own, he was certain that he caught a flash of recognition in the other's eyes. "He expected that," he soliloquised, as he picked up his paper again. "Here is a mystery! Deuce take the fellow—why did he stare at me so? He isn't as handsome as I thought he was in the glass—he's ill-tempered and awkward; it isn't a pleasant face, though of course the features are good. He might make a good picture—and, by Jove! that's what he was—a picture! and I didn't know him out of his frame! I wonder whether it's a chance resemblance, or whether——"
"Were you ever at a place called Mitchelhurst?" he asked, abruptly.
The blood mounted to Harding's face.
"Yes," he said.
"Then," said Adrian, "you must surely be some connection of the family at the old Place—the old family at the old Place, I mean. I have made out the likeness that puzzled me. There is a picture there——"
"I am connected with the family," said Harding, "on my mother's side. It isn't much to boast of——"