oast, according to his
custom, and when he had finished, sat out his three or four minutes
as was usual. Then he got up to retire to his room, with the envelope
still unbroken in his pocket.

"You will go to church with us, I suppose?" said Lady Aylmer.

"I won't promise, ma'am; but if I do, I'll walk across the park,--so
that you need not wait for me."

Then both the mother and sister knew that the member for Perivale did
not intend to go to church on that occasion. To morning service Sir
Anthony always went, the habits of Aylmer Park having in them more of
adamant in reference to him than they had as regarded his son.

When the father, mother, and daughter returned, Captain Aylmer had
read his letter, and had, after doing so, received further tidings
from Belton Castle,--further tidings which for the moment prevented
the necessity of any reference to the letter, and almost drove it
from his own thoughts. When his mother entered the library he was
standing before the fire with a scrap of paper in his hand.

"Since you have been at church there has come a telegraphic message,"
he said.

"What is it, Frederic? Do not frighten me,--if you can avoid it!"

"You need not be frightened, ma'am, for you did not know him. Mr.
Amedroz is dead."

"No!" said Lady Aylmer, seating herself.

"Dead!" said Belinda, holding up her hands.

"God bless my soul!" said the baronet, who had now followed the
ladies into the room. "Dead! Why, Fred, he was five years younger
than I am!"

Then Captain Aylmer read the words of the message:--"Mr. Amedroz died
this morning at five o'clock. I have sent word to the lawyer and to
Mr. Belton."

"Who does it come from?" asked Lady Aylmer.

"From Colonel Askerton."

Lady Aylmer paused, and shook her head, and moved her foot uneasily
upon the carpet. The tidings, as far as they went, might be
unexceptionable, but the source from whence they had come had
evidently polluted them in her ladyship's judgment. Then she uttered
a series of inter-ejaculations, expressions of mingled sorrow and
anger.

"There was no one else near her," said Captain Aylmer,
apologetically.

"Is there no clergyman in the parish?"

"He lives a long way off. The message had to be sent at once."

"Are there no servants in the house? It looks,--it looks--. But I
am the last person in the world to form a harsh judgment of a young
woman at such a moment as this. What did she say in her letter,
Fred?"

Captain Ayl