e?

To this question the answer which his heart vouchsafed was vain and a
vanity. His head, however, gave innumerable replies--all of them
obvious and none of them flattering. A hundred times Reason drove Hope
headlong, but always the baggage returned....

By way of relieving his feelings, Anthony cursed Mrs. Slumper with
earnest bitterness. He began to feel that there was much in what the
chauffeur had said about her forbears. At the time he had secretly
deplored his epithets, but now.... Certainly he had misjudged the
fellow. He was quite right.

As for Patch, he had never been paid so little attention. Not that he
cared. The country was full of scents....

By a quarter past seven Lyveden was back at Lancaster Gate.

The first thing he saw below stairs was the library silver, which he
had cleaned that morning and the parlour-maid should have restored to
its place. Without waiting to change, he picked up the tray and
carried it upstairs, intending, if the room was unoccupied, to replace
it at once.

As he gained the hall, the twitch of an inserted latchkey came to his
ears. Then pressure was put upon the front door. This, however,
remained fast shut. The key was withdrawn violently, reinserted, and
wrenched. The pressure upon the door being maintained, the lock was
jammed. Whosoever was there had lost his temper and was kicking
against the pricks. This was unlike Mr. Slumper, but it could be
nobody else. Lyveden set down his tray and stepped to the door....

His master came in with a rush, stumbling. Anthony caught him, and he
recovered his balance. There was running sweat upon his face, which
was all grey, and he was shaking fearfully. Holding on to the
furniture as he went, he tottered as far as the library, clawed at the
switch by the door, missed it, and swayed out of sight into the black
of the room.

Anthony stood spellbound. The spectacle of a bunch of keys dangling
idly from the keyhole of the door, which he was still holding open,
brought him to his senses, and, drawing the key from the lock, he
closed the door swiftly and ran for brandy....

Mr. Slumper was sitting in the dark, with his head plunged between his
knees. At Anthony's coming he started up and would have gone back, but
the seat of his chair catching him under the hocks, he subsided again
almost immediately. Anthony went to his side and held the glass to his
lips. As he drank, his teeth chattered upon the rim of th