ything to have kept me away.

"Broken your arm?" I exclaimed, feeling bound to take some notice of the
sling.

"Yes," he replied; "met with an accident to it. But luckily it's only
the left one, so it doesn't hinder me much! I have finished seven
chapters of the last volume of 'Lynwood,' and was just wanting to ask
you a legal question."

All this time his eyes bore my scrutiny defiantly; they seemed to dare
me to say one other word about the broken arm. I didn't dare--indeed to
this day I have never mentioned the subject to him.

But that evening, while he was helping the Major to bed, the old
landlady made some pretext for toiling up to the top of the house, where
I sat smoking in Derrick's room.

"You'll excuse my making bold to speak to you, sir," she said. I threw
down my newspaper, and, looking up, saw that she was bubbling over with
some story.

"Well?" I said, encouragingly.

"It's about Mr. Vaughan, sir, I wanted to speak to you. I really do
think, sir, it's not safe he should be left alone with his father, sir,
any longer. Such doings as we had here the other day, sir! Somehow or
other--and none of us can't think how--the Major had managed to get hold
of a bottle of brandy. How he had it I don't know; but we none of us
suspected him, and in the afternoon he says he was too poorly to go for
a drive or to go out in his chair, and settles off on the parlour sofa
for a nap while Mr. Vaughan goes out for a walk. Mr. Vaughan was out a
couple of hours. I heard him come in and go into the sitting-room;
then there came sounds of voices, and a scuffling of feet and moving of
chairs, and I knew something was wrong and hurried up to the door--and
just then came a crash like fire-irons, and I could hear the Major
a-swearing fearful. Not hearing a sound from Mr. Vaughan, I got scared,
sir, and opened the door, and there I saw the Major a leaning up against
the mantelpiece as drunk as a lord, and his son seemed to have got the
bottle from him; it was half empty, and when he saw me he just handed it
to me and ordered me to take it away. Then between us we got the Major
to lie down on the sofa and left him there. When we got out into the
passage Mr. Vaughan he leant against the wall for a minute, looking as
white as a sheet, and then I noticed for the first time that his left
arm was hanging down at his side. 'Lord! sir,' I cried, 'your arm's
broken.' And he went all at once as red as he had been pale just before,
and