He turned down a leafy lane, and had disappeared from view before the chaise reached the spot.  As it ran by, its only occupant, a big, red-faced, white-wigged old gentleman, caught sight of the boy and hailed him in a rich, jolly voice.

“Ha, Desmond!  Home again, you see!  Scotched the enemy once more!  Come and see me!”

The chaise was past before Desmond could reply.  He watched it until it vanished from sight; then, feeling somewhat cheered, went on to report to his brother that the squire had at last returned.

He felt no little curiosity about his new acquaintance.  What had brought him to so retired a spot as Market Drayton?  He could have no friends in the neighborhood, or he would surely not have chosen for his lodging a place of ill repute like the Four Alls.  Yet he had seemed to have some acquaintance with Grinsell the innkeeper.  He did not answer to Desmond’s idea of an adventurer.  He was not rough of tongue or boisterous in manner; his accent, indeed, was refined; his speech somewhat studied, and, to judge by his allusions and his Latin, he had some share of polite learning.  Desmond was puzzled to fit these apparent incongruities, and looked forward with interest to further meetings with Marmaduke Diggle.

During the next few days they met more than once.  It was always late in the evening, always in quiet places, and Diggle was always alone.  Apparently he desired to make no acquaintances.  The gossips of the neighborhood seized upon the presence of a stranger at the Four Alls, but they caught the barest glimpses of him; Grinsell was as a stone wall in unresponsiveness to their inquiries; and the black boy, if perchance a countryman met him on the road and questioned him, shook his head and made meaningless noises in his throat, and the countryman would assure his cronies that the boy was as dumb as a platter.

But whenever Desmond encountered the stranger, strolling by himself in the fields or some quiet lane, Diggle always seemed pleased to see him, and talked to him with the same ease and freedom, ever ready with a tag from his school books.  Desmond did not like his Latin, but he found compensation in the traveler’s tales of which Diggle had an inexhaustible store—­tales of shipwreck and mutiny, of wild animals and wild men, of Dutch traders and Portuguese adventurers, of Indian nawabs and French bucaneers.  Above all was Desmond interested in stories of India:  he heard of the immense wealth of the Indian princes, the rivalries of the English, French, and Dutch trading companies; the keen struggle between France and England for the preponderating influence with the natives.  Desmond was eager to hear of Clive’s doings; but he found Diggle, for an Englishman who had been in India, strangely ignorant of Clive’s career; he seemed impatient of Clive’s name, and was always more ready to talk of his French rivals, Dupleix and Bussy.  The boy was impressed by the mystery, the color, the romance of the East; and after these talks with Diggle he went home with his mind afire, and dreamed of elephants and tigers, treasures of gold and diamonds, and fierce battles in which English, French, and Indians weltered in seas of blood.