“Johnny,” Julia said, as they stood watching Joost pot the bulb, “you are not to tell father how valuable this is.  He will find out quite soon enough; people are sure to bother me to sell it after it has been exhibited, and I am not going to.”

“No,” Johnny said; “of course not, naturally not.”

So Captain Polkington had no idea why Joost carried away a carefully tied-up flower pot when he left the cottage that afternoon.  He only thought the young man must have a most remarkable enthusiasm for flowers to so burden himself on a long walk.

* * * * *

And in due time the wonderful streaked daffodil, “Narcissus Triandrus Striatum, The Good Comrade,” grown by Miss Snooks of White’s Cottage, Halgrave, was exhibited at the Temple Show.  And bulb growers, professional and amateur, waxed enthusiastic over it.  And the general public who went to the show, admired it or not, as their taste and education allowed them.  And among the general public who went, was a Miss Lillian Farham, a girl who, last September, had travelled north with carnations in her coat and Rawson-Clew in a corner of the railway carriage.  Miss Farham was an enthusiastic gardener, and having means and leisure and a real taste for it, she had some notable successes in the garden of her beautiful home; and when she was in town she never missed an opportunity of attending a good show, seeing something new, and learning what she could.  She was naturally much interested in the new streaked daffodil; so much so, that she spoke of it afterwards, not only to those people who shared her taste, but also to at least one who did not.

Rawson-Clew was back in London.  He had not been back long, but already he had begun the preliminaries of a search for Mr. Gillat.  He decided that it would be easier to find him than Julia, who might possibly have changed her name to oblige her family, and who certainly would be better able to hide herself, if she had a mind to, than Mr. Gillat.  He had not as yet been able to devote many days to the search, and had got no further than preliminaries; still he could already see that it was not going to be easy and might possibly be long.  He did not go to the show of spring flowers; he did not feel the least interest in it, but when by chance he met Lillian Farham she spoke of it to him and also of the new daffodil.

“It was grown at Halgrave, too,” she said; “that is not so very far from your part of Norfolk, is it?”

“Fifteen or twenty miles,” Rawson-Clew answered.

“Is it so much as that?” she said; “I thought it was nearer; of course, then, you can’t tell me anything about the grower.”

He could not; it is probable even if the place had been much nearer, he still could not, seeing that it was some years since he had been to “his part of Norfolk.”  However, he gave polite attention to Miss Farham, who went on to describe the wonderful flower of mixed yellow and blue.