his good behaviour, probably
at a lower cost than the regular stipend. In handing the cheque to Cecil
Baskelett, Mr. Romfrey spoke of a poacher, of an old poaching family
called the Dicketts, who wanted punishment and was to have it, but Mr.
Romfrey's local lawyer had informed him that the man Shrapnel was, as
usual, supplying the means of defence. For his own part, Mr. Romfrey
said, he had no objection to one rascal's backing another, and Shrapnel
might hit his hardest, only perhaps Nevil might somehow get mixed up
in it, and Nevil was going on quietly now--he had in fact just done
capitally in lassoing with a shot of the telegraph a splendid little
Jersey bull that a Yankee was after: and on the whole it was best to try
to keep him quiet, for he was mad about that man Shrapnel; Shrapnel
was his joss: and if legal knocks came of this business Nevil might be
thinking of interfering: 'Or he and I may be getting to exchange a lot
of shindy letters,' Mr. Romfrey said. 'Tell him I take Shrapnel just
like any other man, and don't want to hear apologies, and I don't mix
him up in it. Tell him if he likes to have an explanation from me,
I'll give it him when he comes here. You can run over to Holdesbury the
morning after your dinner.'

Captain Baskelett said he would go. He was pleased with his cheque at
the time, but hearing subsequently that Nevil was coming to Steynham to
meet Colonel Halkett and his daughter, he became displeased, considering
it a very silly commission. The more he thought of it the more
ridiculous and unworthy it appeared. He asked himself and Lord Palmet
also why he should have to go to Nevil at Holdesbury to tell him of
circumstances that he would hear of two or three days later at Steynham.
There was no sense in it. The only conclusion for him was that the
scheming woman Culling had determined to bring down every man concerned
in the Bevisham election, and particularly Mr. Romfrey, on his knees
before Nevil. Holdesbury had been placed at his disposal, and the use of
the house in London, which latter would have been extremely serviceable
to Cecil as a place of dinners to the Parliament of Great Britain in
lieu of the speech-making generally expected of Members, and not so
effectively performed. One would think the baron had grown afraid of old
Nevil! He had spoken as if he were.

Cecil railed unreservedly to Lord Palmet against that woman 'Mistress
Culling,' as it pleased him to term her, and who could