With a vindictive look, and pouting lips, Ned turned his steps down the walk.  Just then he noticed Philip Winwood, who had viewed every detail of the scene with wonder, and who now regarded Ned with a kind of vaguely disliking curiosity, such as one bestows on some sinister-looking strange animal.  Philip’s look was, of course, unconscious, but none the less clearly to be read for that.  Ned Faringfield, pausing on his way, stared at the unknown lad, with an expression of insolent inquiry.  Not daring to stay for questions, but observing the valise, he seemed to become aware that the newcomer was an already accepted guest of the house; and he thereupon surveyed Philip a moment, inwardly measuring him as a possible comrade or antagonist, but affecting a kind of disdain.  A look from his father ended Ned’s inspection, and sent him hastily toward his imprisonment, whither he went with no one’s pity but Fanny’s—­for his mother had become afraid of him, and little Tom took his likes and dislikes from his sister Madge.

And so they went in to supper, disappearing from my sight behind the corner of the parlour wing as they mounted the rear veranda:  Mr. and Mrs. Faringfield first, the mother leading Fanny by the wounded wrist; the big dog next, wagging his tail for no particular reason; and then Philip Winwood, with his cat in his basket, Madge at one side of him and pretending an interest in the kitten while from beneath her lashes she alertly watched the boy himself, little Tom on the other side holding Philip’s hand.  I stood at the gateway, looking after; and with all my young infatuation for Madge, I had no feeling but one of liking, for this quiet, strange lad, with the pale, kind face.  And I would to God I might see those three still walking together, as when children, through this life that has dealt so strangely with them all since that Summer evening.

CHAPTER II.

The Faringfields.

Having shown how Philip Winwood came among us, I ought to tell at once, though of course I learned it from him afterwards, all that need be known of his previous life.  His father, after leaving Oxford and studying medicine in Edinburgh, had married a lady of the latter city, and emigrated to Philadelphia to practise as a physician.  But whether ’twas that the Quaker metropolis was overstocked with doctors even then, or for other reasons, there was little call for Doctor Winwood’s ministrations.  Moreover, he was of so book-loving a disposition that if he happened to have sat down to a favourite volume, and a request came for his services, it irked him exceedingly to respond.  This being noticed and getting abroad, did not help him in his profession.