efore the news of Lord Popenjoy's
death had been brought down stairs by Mr. De Baron. Being only Jack De
Baron he had sent to Brotherton for a fly, and in that conveyance had
had himself taken to the "Lion," arriving there three or four hours
before the time at which he purposed to leave the town. Indeed his
arrangements had intentionally been left so open that he might if he
liked remain the night,--or if he pleased, remain a week at the "Lion."
He thought it not improbable that the Dean might ask him to dinner,
and, if so, he certainly would dine with the Dean.

He was very serious,--considering who he was, we may almost say solemn,
as he sat in the fly. It was the rule of his life to cast all cares
from him, and his grand principle to live from hand to mouth. He was
almost a philosopher in his epicureanism, striving always that nothing
should trouble him. But now he had two great troubles, which he could
not throw off from him. In the first place, after having striven
against it for the last four or five years with singular success, he
had in a moment of weakness allowed himself to become engaged to Guss
Mildmay. She had gone about it so subtlely that he had found himself
manacled almost before he knew that the manacles were there. He had
fallen into the trap of an hypothesis, and now felt that the
preliminary conditions on which he had seemed to depend could never
avail him. He did not mean to marry Guss Mildmay. He did not suppose
that she thought he meant to marry her. He did not love her, and he did
not believe very much in her love for him. But Guss Mildmay, having
fought her battle in the world for many years with but indifferent
success, now felt that her best chance lay in having a bond upon her
old lover. He ought not to have gone to Rudham when he knew that she
was to be there. He had told himself that before, but he had not liked
to give up the only chance which had come in his way of being near Lady
George since she had left London. And now he was an engaged man,--a
position which had always been to him full of horrors. He had run his
bark on to the rock, which it had been the whole study of his
navigation to avoid. He had committed the one sin which he had always
declared to himself that he never would commit. This made him unhappy.

And he was uneasy also,--almost unhappy,--respecting Lady George.
People whom he knew to be bad had told him things respecting her which
he certainly did not believe, but w