The eyes seemed looking at him.

He answered to the look.

There was in him the romantic strain, and something more! In the remote parts of his being there was the capacity for the phenomenal, the strange.

Once again, as in the church, he saw the field of Naseby, King Charles, Ireton's men, Cromwell and his Ironsides, Prince Rupert and the swarming rush of cavalry, and the end of it all! Had it been a tale of his father's at camp-fire?
Had he read it somewhere?
He felt his blood thump in his veins.

Another half-hour, wherein he was learning every minute, nothing escaping him, everything interesting him; his grandfather and Mrs.
Gasgoyne especially, then the ladies retired slowly with their crippled hostess, who gave Gaston, as she rose, a look almost painfully intense.
It haunted him.
Now Gaston had his chance.