rranged plans, Sir Edmund
was to have been at home by middle day, crossing by the night boat from
the continent. Middle day came and went; afternoon came and went;
evening came--and he had not come. Miss Hautley would have set the
telegraph to work, had she known where to set it to.

But good luck was in store for her. A train, arriving between six and
seven, brought him; and his carriage--the carriage of his late father,
which had been waiting at the station since eleven o'clock in the
morning--conveyed him home.

Very considerably astonished was Sir Edmund to find the programme which
had been carved out for the night's amusement. He did not like it; it
jarred upon his sense of propriety; and he spoke a hint of this to Miss
Hautley. It was the death of his father which had called him home; a
father with whom he had lived for the last few years of his life upon
terms of estrangement--at any rate, upon one point; was it seemly that
his inauguration should be one of gaiety? Yes, Miss Hautley decisively
answered. Their friends were not meeting to bewail Sir Rufus's death;
_that_ took place months ago; but to welcome his, Sir Edmund's, return,
and his entrance on his inheritance.

Sir Edmund--a sunny-tempered, yielding man, the very opposite in spirit
to his dead father, to his live aunt--conceded the point; doing it with
all the better grace, perhaps, that there was now no help for it. In an
hour's time the guests would be arriving. Miss Hautley inquired
curiously as to the point upon which he and Sir Rufus had been at issue;
she had never been able to learn it from Sir Rufus. Neither did it now
appear that she was likely to learn it from Sir Edmund. It was a private
matter, he said, a smile crossing his lips as he spoke; one entirely
between himself and his father, and he could not speak of it. It had
driven him abroad she believed, Miss Hautley remarked, vexed that she
was still to remain in the dark. Yes, acquiesced Sir Edmund; it had
driven him abroad and kept him there.

He was ready, and stood in his place to receive his guests; a tall man,
of some five-and-thirty years, with a handsome face and pleasant smile
upon it. He greeted his old friends cordially, those with whom he had
been intimate, and was laughing and talking with the Countess of Elmsley
when the announcement "Lady and Miss Verner" caught his ear.

It caused him to turn abruptly. Breaking off in the midst of a sentence,
he quitted the countess and w