, even more than his
son's extravagance.

"Well, sir?" said the doctor.

"And how did you get home, sir, with your fair companion?" said
Bertie. "I suppose she is not upstairs, Charlotte?"

"Bertie," said Charlotte, "Papa is in no humour for joking. He is
very angry with you."

"Angry!" said Bertie, raising his eyebrows as though he had never yet
given his parent cause for a single moment's uneasiness.

"Sit down, if you please, sir," said Dr. Stanhope very sternly
but not now very loudly. "And I'll trouble you to sit down, too,
Charlotte. Your mother can wait for her tea a few minutes."

Charlotte sat down on the chair nearest to the door in somewhat of a
perverse sort of manner, as much as though she would say--"Well, here
I am; you shan't say I don't do what I am bid; but I'll be whipped if
I give way to you." And she was determined not to give way. She too
was angry with Bertie, but she was not the less ready on that account
to defend him from his father. Bertie also sat down. He drew his
chair close to the library-table, upon which he put his elbow, and
then resting his face comfortably on one hand, he began drawing
little pictures on a sheet of paper with the other. Before the scene
was over he had completed admirable figures of Miss Thorne, Mrs.
Proudie, and Lady De Courcy, and begun a family piece to comprise the
whole set of the Lookalofts.

"Would it suit you, sir," said the father, "to give me some idea as
to what your present intentions are? What way of living you propose
to yourself?"

"I'll do anything you can suggest, sir," replied Bertie.

"No, I shall suggest nothing further. My time for suggesting has
gone by. I have only one order to give, and that is that you leave
my house."

"To-night?" said Bertie, and the simple tone of the question left the
doctor without any adequately dignified method of reply.

"Papa does not quite mean to-night," said Charlotte; "at least I
suppose not."

"To-morrow, perhaps," suggested Bertie.

"Yes, sir, to-morrow," said the doctor. "You shall leave this
to-morrow."

"Very well, sir. Will the 4.30 P.M. train be soon enough?" and
Bertie, as he asked, put the finishing touch to Miss Thorne's
high-heeled boots.

"You may go how and when and where you please, so that you leave
my house to-morrow. You have disgraced me, sir; you have disgraced
yourself, and me, and your sisters."

"I am glad at least, sir, that I have not disgraced my mother," said
Berti