y of Mary's meddlesome friends, who are doing more injury
than good to their queen's cause by their plotting."

I replied: "No one can regret these plots more than I do. They certainly
will work great injury to the cause they are intended to help. But I fear
many innocent men are made to suffer for the few guilty ones. Without your
protection, for which I cannot sufficiently thank you, my life here would
probably be of short duration. After my misfortunes in Scotland, I know
not what I should have done had it not been for your generous welcome. I
lost all in Scotland, and it would now be impossible for me to go to
France. An attempt on my part to escape would result in my arrest. Fortune
certainly has turned her capricious back upon me, with the one exception
that she has left me your friendship."

"Malcolm, my boy," said Sir George, drawing his chair toward me, "that
which you consider your loss is my great gain. I am growing old, and if
you, who have seen so much of the gay world, will be content to live with
us and share our dulness and our cares, I shall be the happiest man in
England."

"I thank you more than I can tell," I said, careful not to commit myself
to any course.

"Barring my quarrel with the cursed race of Manners," continued Sir
George, "I have little to trouble me; and if you will remain with us, I
thank God I may leave the feud in good hands. Would that I were young
again only for a day that I might call that scoundrel Rutland and his imp
of a son to account in the only manner whereby an honest man may have
justice of a thief. There are but two of them, Malcolm,--father and
son,--and if they were dead, the damned race would be extinct."

I believe that Sir George Vernon when sober could not have spoken in that
fashion even of his enemies.

I found difficulty in replying to my cousin's remarks, so I said
evasively:--

"I certainly am the most fortunate of men to find so warm a welcome from
you, and so good a home as that which I have at Haddon Hall. When I met
Dorothy at the inn, I knew at once by her kindness that my friends of old
were still true to me. I was almost stunned by Dorothy's beauty."

My mention of Dorothy was unintentional and unfortunate. I had shied from
the subject upon several previous occasions, but Sir George was
continually trying to lead up to it. This time my lack of forethought
saved him the trouble.

"Do you really think that Doll is very beautiful--so very beautiful