her to be raised
to a position for which she is not prepared.'

'I thought you were on her side, mother.'

'There are no sides, Freda,' said her father reprovingly. 'The whole
must rest with the persons chiefly concerned, and no one ought to
interfere or influence them in either direction.' Having thus rebuked
Mr. Burford quite as much as his daughter, he added, 'Where is Lord
Northmoor now?'

'He wrote to me from Northmoor after the funeral, Sir Edward, saying that
he would return on Saturday. Of course, though three months' notice
would be due, I should not expect it, as I told him at first; but he
assures me that he will not leave me till my arrangements for supplying
his place are complete, and he will assist me as usual.'

'It is very proper of him,' said Sir Edward.

'It will be awkward in some ways,' said Mr. Burford. 'Yet I do not know
what I could otherwise have done, he had become so necessary to me.'

'Stick or no stick,' was the family comment of the Kentons, 'there must
be something in the man, if only his head is not turned.'

'Which,' observed Sir Edward, 'is not possible to a stick with a real
head, but only too easy to a sham one.'

CHAPTER IV
HONOURS WANING

'And who is the man?' So asked a lady in deep mourning of another still
more becraped, as they sat together in the darkened room of a Northmoor
house on the day before the funeral.

The speaker had her bonnet by her side, and showed a kindly, clever,
middle-aged face. She was Mrs. Bury, a widow, niece of the late Lord;
the other was his daughter, Bertha Morton, a few years younger. She was
not tearful, but had dark rings round her eyes, and looked haggard and
worn.

'The man? I never heard of him till this terrible loss of poor little
Mikey.'

'Then did he put in a claim?'

'Oh no, but Hailes knew about him, and so, indeed, did my father. It
seems that three generations ago there was a son who followed the
instincts of our race further than usual, and married a jockey's
daughter, or something of that sort. He was set up in a horse-breeding
farm and cut the connection; but it seems that there was always a sort of
communication of family events, so that Hailes knew exactly where to look
for an heir.'

'Not a jockey!'

'Oh no, nothing so diverting. That would be fun!' Bertha said, with a
laugh that had no merriment in it. 'He is a clerk--an attorney's clerk!
What do you think of that, Lettice?'

'Better than