Chapter 31 IN THE TWINKLING OF AN EYE

In a garden near the old bear-yard, among tall rose-trees which would soon be in bloom, a merry company of men were sitting around a table which stood in the angle of a quick-set hedge beside a path graveled with white stones and bordered with mussel-shells.

There was a house hard by with creamy-white walls, green-shuttered windows, and a red-ti