m in uncertain speech, and said he would
be ready. In the meantime he would go and play billiards with the marker
whilst Harold was having his dinner.

At ten o'clock Harold's dogcart was ready and he went to look for
Leonard, who had not since come near him. He found him half asleep in
the smoking-room, much drunker than he had been earlier in the evening.

The drive was fairly long, so Harold made up his mind for a prolonged
term of uneasiness and anxiety. The cool night-air, whose effect was
increased by the rapid motion, soon increased Leonard's somnolence and
for a while he slept soundly, his companion watching carefully lest he
should sway over and fall out of the trap. He even held him up as they
swung round sharp corners.

After a time he woke up, and woke in a nasty temper. He began to find
fault in an incoherent way with everything. Harold said little, just
enough to prevent any cause for further grievance. Then Leonard changed
and became affectionate. This mood was a greater bore than the other,
but Harold managed to bear it with stolid indifference. Leonard was this
by time making promises to do things for him, that as he was what he
called a 'goo' fell',' he might count on his help and support in the
future. As Harold knew him to be a wastrel, over head and ears in debt
and with only the succession to a small estate, he did not take much heed
to his maunderings. At last the drunken man said something which
startled him so much that he instinctively drew himself together with
such suddenness as to frighten the horse and almost make him rear up
straight.

'Woa! Woa! Steady, boy. Gently!' he said, quieting him. Then turning
to his companion said in a voice hollow with emotion and vibrant with
suppressed passion:

'What was it you said?'

Leonard, half awake, and not half of that half master of himself,
answered:

'I said I will make you agent of Normanstand when I marry Stephen.'

Harold grew cold. To hear of any one marrying Stephen was to him like
plunging him in a glacier stream; but to hear her name so lightly spoken,
and by such a man, was a bewildering shock which within a second set his
blood on fire.

'What do you mean?' he thundered. 'You marry Ste . . . Miss Norman!
You're not worthy to untie her shoe! You indeed! She wouldn't look on
the same side of the street with a drunken brute like you! How dare you
speak of her in such a way!'

'Brute!' said Leonard angrily, hi