but the of the exclamation him and the words called up thrilling memories of his own days when he had ridden his grandfather s horses in the famous hunting valley not a hundred miles from met his smile with a glow of understanding you like riding too i m sure i used to but i haven t been in the saddle for years factory don t keep hunters he said laughing her murmur of embarrassment showed that took this as an allusion to his reduced condition and in his haste to correct this impression he added if i regretted an thing in my other life it would certainly lie a gallop on a day like tliis but i chose my trade deliberately and i ve never been sorry for my choice � � the fruit of the tree he had hardly spoken when he felt the of this but her prompt response showed him a moment later that it was after all the way to his end you find the work interesting i m sure it must be you ll think me very ignorant � my husband and i came here so seldom i feel as if i ought to know so much more about it she explained at last the note for which he waited had been struck won t you try to � now you re here there s so much worth knowing he broke out mrs coloured but rather with surprise than displeasure i m very stupid � i ve no head for but i will to she said it s not business that i mean it s the personal � just the thing the business point of view leaves out i don t suppose your could be better run but there are over seven hundred women working in them and there s so much to be done just for them and their children he caught a faint hint of in her tone i have always understood that mr did everything flushed but he was beyond caring for the personal do you leave it to your little girl s nurses to do eveiy thing for her he asked her surprise seemed about to verge on annoyance the fruit op the tree he saw the of the woman who is put to the trouble of defending her dignity really i don t see � she began with distant politeness then her face changed and melted and again her blood spoke for her before her lips i am glad you told me that mr of course i want to do whatever i can i should like you to point out s resolve had been taken while she spoke he would point out would stretch his op to its limit all thoughts ot personal prudence were flung to the winds � her blush and tone had the waiting he would declare war on at once and take the chance of dismissal at least before he went he would have brought this exquisite creature face to face with the wrongs from which her luxuries were drawn and set in motion the impulses of indignation and pity he did not stop to weigh the permanent advantage of this course his only feeling was that the chance would never again be given him � that if he let her go away back to her usual life with eyes and heart untouched there would be no hope of her ever returning it was far better that he should leave for good and that she should come back as come l she must more and more often if once she could be made to feel the crying need ot her presence � the fruit of the tree but where was he to begin how give her even a glimpse of the packed and intricate situation mrs he said there s no time to say much now but before we get to the mills i want to ask you a favour if as you go through them you see anything that seems to need explaining will you let me come and tell you about it tonight i say tonight he added meeting her look of because later � tomorrow even � i might not have the chance there are some things � a good many � in the management of the mills that mr doesn t see as i do i don t mean business questions wages and and so on � those are out of my province i speak merely in the line of my own work � my care of the hands and what i believe they need and don t get under the present system naturally if mr were well i shouldn t have had this chance of putting the case to you but since it s come my way i must seize it and take the consequences even as he spoke by a swift reaction of thought those consequences rose before him in all seriousness it was not only or chiefly that he feared to lose his place though he knew his mother had not spoken lightly in the case of the whom to gratify a personal spite had for months kept out of a job in his trade and there were special reasons why should heed her warning in the fruit op the tree a manual trade instead of one of the gentlemanly professions which the men of her family had always followed he had not only disappointed her hopes and to a great extent thrown away the benefits of the education she had pinched herself to give him but had disturbed all the habits oi her life by removing her from her normal surroundings to the exile ot a factory settlement however much he blamed himself for this sacrifice it had been made so cheerfully that the consciousness oi it never clouded his life with his mother but her self made him the more alive to his own obligations and 