When I returned to the sitting-room I found that my mother had hurried into the kitchen, where the crackling of sticks showed that she was busy in building a fire.

Decimus Saxon was seated at the edge of the iron-bound oak chest at the side of my father, and was watching him keenly with his little twinkling eyes, while the old man was fixing his horn glasses and breaking the seals of the packet which his strange visitor had just handed to him.
I saw that when my father looked at the signature at the end of the long, closely written letter he gave a whiff of surprise and sat motionless for a moment or so staring at it.

Then he turned to the commencement and read it very carefully through, after which he turned it over and read it again.

Clearly it brought no unwelcome news, for his eyes sparkled with joy when he looked up from his reading, and more than once he laughed aloud.

Finally he asked the man Saxon how it had come into his possession, and whether he was aware of the contents.
'Why, as to that,' said the messenger, 'it was handed to me by no less a person than Dicky Rumbold himself, and in the presence of others whom it's not for me to name.