o
lose."

"Shall I go, I wonder?" said Glory, with a strange gravity.

"Indeed yes, dear. Why not? You've not been in good spirits lately, and
it will do you good. Besides, you deserve a holiday after a six months'
season. And then it's such a great day for _him_, too----"

"Very well, I'll go," said Glory, and at that moment a twitch of her
nervous fingers broke a button off one of the gloves. She drew it off,
threw both gloves on to a side table, took up another pair that lay
there, and followed Rosa downstairs. An open carriage was waiting for
them in the outer court of the inn, and ten minutes afterward they drew
up in a narrow street off Whitehall under a wide archway which opened
into the large and silent quadrangle leading to the principal public
offices. It was the Home Office; the carriage had come for Drake.

Drake had seen changes in his life too. His father was dead and he had
succeeded to the baronetcy. He had also inherited a racing establishment
which the family had long upheld, and a colt which had been entered for
the Derby nearly three years ago was to run in the race that day. Its
name was Ellan Vannin, and it was not a favourite. Notwithstanding the
change in his fortunes, Drake still held his position of private
secretary to the Secretary of State, but it was understood that he was
shortly to enter public life under the wing of the Government, and to
stand for the first constituency that became vacant. Ministers predicted
a career for him; there was nothing he might not aspire to, and hardly
anything he might not do.

Parliament had adjourned in honour of the day on which the "Isthmian
games" were celebrated, and the Home Secretary, as leader of the Lower
House, had said that horse-racing was "a noble and distinguished sport
deserving of a national holiday." But the Minister himself, and
consequently his secretary, had been compelled to put in an appearance at
their office for all that. There was urgent business demanding prompt
attention.

In the large green room of the Home Office overlooking the empty
quadrangle, the Minister, dressed in a paddock coat, received a
deputation of six clergymen. It included Archdeacon Wealthy, who served
as its spokesman. In a rotund voice, strutting a step and swinging his
glasses, the Archdeacon stated their case. They had come, most
reluctantly and with a sense of pain and grief and humiliation, to make
representations about a brother clergyman. It was the