"You look tired, my man."
Gray's tone of cool superiority was not resented by the wayfarer. He got up and came nearer.
"I've had a longish tramp," he said in a thin, not unpleasant voice. "I'm bound for Warrandilla, Mr. Morton's place. I've begun to fear as how I've missed my road."
"Oh, you're all right!" Gray returned indifferently; "the station is just over the rise there. You'll see it in a mile or so."
The man looked in the direction Gray pointed, and then turned his eyes again on Gray's face. Curious, shifty, cunning eyes they were—eyes that went well with the narrow, cruel mouth, and the sharply-pointed chin.
"Perhaps you're Mr. Morton yourself, sir," he said ingratiatingly. "You deserve to be, I'm sure."
"No such luck," said Gray with a laugh, not ill pleased at the man's suggestion. "But you'll find him at home if you go on. I've just left him."
Gray was about to ride on, when the man spoke again.
"I won't detain you a minute, sir, but perhaps you can tell me if I've got a chance of some work over there."
"It depends on what you can do, and who you are, you know," said Gray, with a brief comprehensive glance over the man's figure.