many years; though after Annetta's marriage, and consequent removal
to Stapleford, he had seen no more of her, the neighbouring practitioner
who attended the Petricks having then become her doctor as a matter of
course. Timothy was impressed by the insight and knowledge disclosed in
the conversation of the Budmouth physician, and the acquaintance ripening
to intimacy, the physician alluded to a form of hallucination to which
Annetta's mother and grandmother had been subject--that of believing in
certain dreams as realities. He delicately inquired if Timothy had ever
noticed anything of the sort in his wife during her lifetime; he, the
physician, had fancied that he discerned germs of the same peculiarity in
Annetta when he attended her in her girlhood. One explanation begat
another, till the dumbfoundered Timothy Petrick was persuaded in his own
mind that Annetta's confession to him had been based on a delusion.

'You look down in the mouth?' said the doctor, pausing.

'A bit unmanned. 'Tis unexpected-like,' sighed Timothy.

But he could hardly believe it possible; and, thinking it best to be
frank with the doctor, told him the whole story which, till now, he had
never related to living man, save his dying grandfather. To his
surprise, the physician informed him that such a form of delusion was
precisely what he would have expected from Annetta's antecedents at such
a physical crisis in her life.

Petrick prosecuted his inquiries elsewhere; and the upshot of his labours
was, briefly, that a comparison of dates and places showed irrefutably
that his poor wife's assertion could not possibly have foundation in
fact. The young Marquis of her tender passion--a highly moral and bright-
minded nobleman--had gone abroad the year before Annetta's marriage, and
had not returned till after her death. The young girl's love for him had
been a delicate ideal dream--no more.

Timothy went home, and the boy ran out to meet him; whereupon a strangely
dismal feeling of discontent took possession of his soul. After all,
then, there was nothing but plebeian blood in the veins of the heir to
his name and estates; he was not to be succeeded by a noble-natured line.
To be sure, Rupert was his son; but that glory and halo he believed him
to have inherited from the ages, outshining that of his brother's
children, had departed from Rupert's brow for ever; he could no longer
read history in the boy's face, and centuries of domination