do. But really you must forgive me for saying that such a notion as that is at least as perverse as any that ever came into poor Tom's head."

"I take leave to differ," returned Robert. "My feeling is that I am bound, so far as in me lies, to place the estate in capable hands, and I know of none more capable than yours."

66 The hands of a blind old man!"

"A man who was blinded by me," answered the other, with a sudden tremor in his harsh voice.

"Ah, Robert, have we been friends for so many years and do you still know me so little! Can't you understand that the worst part of a misfortune to which I have become so habituated that I have almost ceased to regard it as a misfortune has been the knowledge that it has cast a gloom over your life? Can't you see the cruelty of offering to make atonement where you owe none by forcing wealth which I don't covet upon me at the end of my life?"

"You mistake me, indeed you do!" Robert protested. "I express myself badly; I am rough and clumsy and—and perverse, if you like; but I am not a brute. The thought of offering you reparation never entered my mind; I only thought, as I still think, that you are better fitted than anybody else whom I know to follow my brother in the control of a property which he would have mismanaged far worse than he did, but for your advice and help."

"That may be," agreed old Humphry, with a slight shrug of his shoulders, " and it is true that, were I to be put in possession of the property tomorrow, my first act would be to bequeath it to your eldest son. In which queer, roundabout way justice would eventually be done. Nevertheless, I must beg you to dismiss such fantastic ideas, and, at the risk of provoking you, I

must repeat that, in my judgment, you ought to name Cuthbert."

"That," declared Mr. Scarth obstinately, "I shall not do.”

Mr. Trenchard sighed. "Then it becomes more than ever incumbent upon me to see to it that Nigel remains where he is. Ah, you Scarths!-you are difficult people to lead and impossible to drive!"

CHAPTER XVI

PACIFICATION

WING to the inclemency of the weather and other causes-perhaps rather more as a result of other causes than of the inclemency of the weather-Lord Lannowe's family party for Christmas fell through. His married daughters, one and all, wrote to make excuse, and if he suspected that this was because they looked forward to entertaining livelier company in their own houses than he could offer them in his, he was nevertheless not unwilling to excuse them.

"You see," he remarked to Colonel Gervase, who, for his part, had faithfully kept a long-standing engagement, "if Frances and Georgie were to come here now, I am not at all sure that they wouldn't do more harm than good. They tell me plainly that they think it ridiculous of me to have given young Scarth his congé, they would certainly do all they could to bring the match on again if they had the chance, and really, with Monnie in her present condition of mind, I wouldn't answer for the consequences of her being hustled."

"What," inquired Gervase, "is Monica's present condition of mind?"

Lord Lannowe shrugged his shoulders. "Oh, she is talking about entering religion again. Nolan says she had better be allowed to talk about it won't do it; I hope he is right, I'm sure.

and that she

One thing

for which I suppose we ought to be thankful is that she has given the young fellow up quite as readily as she accepted him. What incomprehensible beings women are!"

"I have generally found them so; but Monica, I think, has a singularly sweet and obedient disposition. Are you sure that she doesn't feel this more than she chooses to show?"

"My dear Ned, she doesn't care a button for the man! It isn't her submission that astonishes me, it's her ever having accepted him." Lord Lannowe added quite gravely, after a moment of meditation, "She must take after her mother and her sisters, I suppose."

Gervase hoped not, but made no rejoinder. Monica was a little saint; yet it was, after all, possible that she resembled the other ladies of her family, who were all of them amiably heartless. Our characters are born with us, and we are not more answerable for them than we are for our features. He said presently:

"The man is really a bad lot, I presume?"

"Well, I hardly know; perhaps not. But what I heard of his goings-on in London left me no alternative. Besides which, I must frankly confess that I never fancied the match and that I was not sorry to shunt him. He wrote me a very decent letter; I may be wrong, but my impression is that he was not altogether sorry to be shunted."

Lord Lannowe and his guest were walking briskly across the snow-covered park towards the lake, which, like that at Rixmouth, was in process of being swept for skaters. The storm had now quite passed away, the sun was shining brightly in a clear sky and, although it was freezing harder than ever, the air was pleasant and exhilarating.

"If this goes on," Lord Lannowe remarked, "we

shall have to improvise sleighs, like Trenchard, who has been careering all over the place on runners for the last three days, I hear. We shall see him on skates next, no doubt. Hullo !-talk of the devil!"

But it was not Mr. Trenchard who now came swiftly and noiselessly within their ken, behind a pair of fine chestnuts, and Gervase, on recognising the new-comer, exclaimed, with pardonable surprise:

"Well, this is an unexpected visitor! Or did you, by any chance, expect him?"

"No; I didn't," answered Lord Lannowe; “but I am glad he has come. Best to get the awkwardness of the first meeting over and have done with it, you know. I call this friendly of him."

Gervase thought it uncommonly impudent of him ; but there he was hardly fair to Nigel, whose motives for paying a call which he dreaded extremely were very far removed from impudence. He was, indeed, so palpably nervous and at a loss for words when he pulled up his horses, in obedience to Lord Lannowe's hail, that it was impossible to help pitying him.

"You gave me to understand that I might call,” he began hesitatingly and with a want of tact which was in itself disarming.

"Only too delighted!" briskly replied Lord Lannowe, who for his part was not easily put out of countenance and who in the course of his life had had to deal with many a situation far more embarrassing than this. "I am afraid you won't find the young ladies at home, though; we are on our way to join them down at the lake. Won't you walk with us and send your horses on to the stables? A beautiful pair they are too! Surely I haven't seen them before, have I?"

"Mr. Trenchard got them for me," said Nigel. "He is a good judge of a horse, I believe."