s kind, when he was but a child, having been
whispered in the family. Could this really be so, and could the
baronet have been led to make this unexpected visit merely for the
purpose of personally examining into the condition or a property of
which he was about to become the legal invader? The nature of this
suspicion affords, at all events, a fair gauge of Marston's estimate
of his cousin's character. And as he revolved these doubts from time to
time, and as he thought of Mademoiselle de Barras's transient, but
unaccountable embarrassment at the mention of Rouen by Sir Wynston--an
embarrassment which the baronet himself appeared for a moment to
reciprocate--undefined, glimmering suspicions of another kind flickered
through the darkness of his mind. He was effectually puzzled; his
surmises and conjectures baffled; and he more than half repented that he
had acceded to his cousin's proposal, and admitted him as an inmate of
his house.

Although Sir Wynston comported himself as if he were conscious of being
the very most welcome visitor who could possibly have established himself
at Gray Forest, he was, doubtless, fully aware of the real feelings with
which he was regarded by his host. If he had in reality an object in
prolonging his stay, and wished to make the postponement of his departure
the direct interest of his entertainer, he unquestionably took effectual
measures for that purpose.

The little party broke up every evening at about ten o'clock, and Sir
Wynston retired to his chamber at the same hour. He found little
difficulty in inducing Marston to amuse him there with a quiet game of
piquet. In his own room, therefore, in the luxurious ease of dressing
gown and slippers he sat at cards with his host, often until an hour or
two past midnight. Sir Wynston was exorbitantly wealthy, and very
reckless in expenditure. The stakes for which they played, although they
gradually became in reality pretty heavy, were in his eyes a very
unimportant consideration. Marston, on the other hand, was poor, and
played with the eye of a lynx and the appetite of a shark. The ease and
perfect good-humor with which Sir Wynston lost were not unimproved by his
entertainer, who, as may readily be supposed, was not sorry to reap this
golden harvest, provided without the slightest sacrifice, on his part, of
pride or independence. If, indeed, he sometimes suspected that his guest
was a little more anxious to lose than to win, he was also qui