e says so."

"I should think he had!" whispered Mrs. Blunt with uplifted hands.

"Good-by, Mrs. Blunt. You don't know how unhappy I am. Thanks, yes, a
hansom, please. Mrs. Blunt, are you going to ask Mr. Merceron here
again?"

Mrs. Blunt's toleration was exhausted.

"Be off with you!" she said sternly, pointing a forefinger at the door.

By great good fortune Agatha found Lord Thrapston at home. Drawing a
footstool beside his chair, she sat down. Her agitation was past, and
she wore a gravely business like air.

"Grandpapa," she began, "I have got something to tell you."

"Go ahead, my dear," said the old gentleman, stroking her golden hair.
Her father had curls like that when he was a boy.

"Something dreadful I've done, you know. But you won't be very angry,
will you?"

"We'll see."

"You oughtn't to be, because you're not very good yourself, are you?"
and she first glanced up into his burnt-out old eyes and then pressed
her lips on his knotted lean old hand.

"Aggy," said he, "I expect you play the deuce with the young fellows,
don't you?"

Agatha laughed softly, but a frown succeeded.

"That's just it," she said. "Now, you're to listen and not interrupt,
or I shall never be able to manage it. And you're not to look at me,
grandpapa."

The narrative--that thrice-told tale--began. As the comments of Mr.
Taylor and Mrs. Blunt were omitted, those of Lord Thrapston may well
receive like treatment, more especially as they tended not to
edification; but before his granddaughter had finished her story the
old man had sworn softly four times and chuckled audibly twice.

"I knew there was a girl in that temple, soon as Calder told me," said
he.

"But you didn't know who it was. Oh, and Calder doesn't?"

"Not he. Well, you've made a pretty little fool of yourself, missie.
What are you going to do now?"

"That's what you've got to tell me."

"I? Oh, I dare say. No, no; you got into the scrape and you can get out
of it. And---" He suddenly recollected his duties. "Look here, Agatha,
I must--hang it, Agatha, I shouldn't be doing my duty as--as a
grandfather if I didn't say that it's a monstrous disgraceful thing of
you to have done. Yes, d----d disgraceful;" and he took a pinch of
snuff with an air of severe virtue.

"Yes, dear; but you shouldn't swear, should you?"

Lord Thrapston felt that he had spoilt the moral effect of his reproof,
and, without dwelling further on that aspect of the subject, he