ainly appear to be a most singular and almost incredible thing,
that, in the enlightened days of the latter half of the nineteenth
century, an official deed should disappear out of a gentleman's desk, in
his own well-guarded residence, in his habited chamber. Conjectures and
thoughts were freely bandied about; while Dr. West and Jan grew nearly
tired of the particulars demanded of them in their professional visits,
for their patients would talk of nothing else.

The first visible effect that the disappointment had, was to stretch
Lady Verner on a sick-bed. She fell into a low, nervous state of
prostration, and her irritability--it must be confessed--was great. But
for this illness, Lionel would have been away. Thrown now upon his own
resources, he looked steadily into the future, and strove to chalk out a
career for himself; one by which--as he had said to Lucy Tempest--he
might earn bread and cheese. Of course, at Lionel Verner's age, and
reared to no profession, unfamiliar with habits of business, that was
easier thought of than done. He had no particular talent for literature;
he believed that, if he tried his hand at that, the bread might come,
but the cheese would be doubtful--although he saw men, with even less
aptitude for it than he, turning to it and embracing it with all the
confidence in the world, as if it were an ever-open resource for all,
when other trades failed. There were the three professions; but were
they available? Lionel felt no inclination to become a working drudge
like poor Jan; and the Church, for which he had not any liking, he was
by far too conscientious to embrace only as a means of living. There
remained the Bar; and to that he turned his attention, and resolved to
qualify himself for it. That there would be grinding, and drudgery, and
hard work, and no pay for years, he knew; but, so there might be, go to
what he would. The Bar did hold out a chance of success, and there was
nothing in it derogatory to the notions in which he had been
reared--those of a gentleman.

Jan came to him one day about the time of the decision, and Lionel told
him that he should soon be away; that he intended to enter himself at
the Middle Temple, and take chambers.

"Law!" said Jan. "Why, you'll be forty, maybe, before you ever get a
brief. You should have entered earlier."

"Yes. But how was I to know that things would turn out like this?"

"Look here," said Jan, tilting himself in a very uncomfortable fas