Mr. Waldron nodded; but he was not finding himself in complete agreement with Raymond.

“Always welcome,” he said.

“Perhaps you’d rather not?  Well—­see how things go.  Estelle may bar me.  I’m at Bridport to-night and return to London to-morrow.  But I shall be back again in a week.”

“Shall you play any cricket this summer?”

“I should like to if I have time; but it’s very improbable.  I’m not going to chuck sport though.  Next year I may have more leisure.”

“You’re at ‘The Seven Stars,’ I hear—­haven’t forgiven Dick Gurd he tells me.”

“Did we quarrel?  I forget.  Seems funny to think I had enough time on my hands to wrangle with an innkeeper.  But I like Missis Northover’s.  It’s quiet.”

“Shall I come in and dine this evening?”

“Wait till I’m back again.  I’ve got to talk to my Aunt Jenny to-night.  She’s one of the old brigade, but I’m hoping to make her see sense.”

“When sense clashes with religion, old man, nobody sees sense.  I’m afraid your opinions won’t entirely commend themselves to Miss Ironsyde.”

“Probably not.  I quite realise that I shall have to exercise the virtue of patience at Bridport and Bridetown for a year or two.  But while I’ve got you for a friend, Arthur, I’m not going to bother.”

Waldron marked the imperious changes and felt somewhat bewildered.  Raymond left him not a little to think about, and when the younger had ridden off, Arthur strolled afield with his thoughts and strove to bring order into them.  He felt in a vague sort of way that he had been talking to a stranger, and his hope, if he experienced a hope, was that the new master of the Mill might not take himself too seriously.  “People who do that are invariably one-sided,” thought Waldron.

Upon Ironsyde’s attitude and intentions with regard to Sabina, he also reflected uneasily.  What Raymond had declared sounded all right, yet Arthur could not break with old rooted opinions and the general view of conduct embodied in his favourite word.  Was it “sporting”?  And more important still, was it true?  Had Ironsyde arrived at his determination from honest conviction, or thanks to the force of changed circumstances?  Mr. Waldron gave his friend the benefit of the doubt.

“One must remember that he is a good sportsman,” he reflected, “and he can’t have enough brains to make him a bad sportsman.”

For the thinker had found within his experience, that those who despised sport, too often despised also the simple ethics that he associated with sportsmanship.  In fact, Arthur, after one or two painful experiences, had explicitly declared that big brains often went hand in hand with a doubtful sense of honour.  He had also, of course, known numerous examples of another sort of dangerous people who assumed the name and distinction of “sportsman” as a garment to hide their true activities and unworthy selves.