deliberate, guarded, and yet expressive manner of the speaker to make
Tom extremely uncomfortable, though there was also sufficient to leave
him in doubts as to his namesake's true meaning. The words emphasized by
the latter, were touched lightly, though distinctly; and the cold,
artificial smile with which they were uttered, completely baffled the
sagacity of a rogue, as common-place as the heir-expectant. Then the
sudden change in the construction of the last sentence, and the
substitution of the name of the person mentioned, for the degree of
affinity in which he was supposed to stand to Tom, might be merely a
rigid observance of the best tone of society, or it might be equivocal.
All these little distinctions gleamed across the mind of Tom Wychecombe;
but that was not the moment to pursue the investigation. Courtesy
required that he should make an immediate answer, which he succeeded in
doing steadily enough as to general appearances, though his sagacious
and practised questioner perceived that his words had not failed of
producing the impression he intended; for he had looked to their
establishing a species of authority over the young man.

"My honoured and beloved uncle has revived a little, they tell me," said
Tom; "but I fear these appearances are delusive. After eighty-four,
death has a fearful hold upon us, sir! The worst of it is, that my poor,
dear uncle's mind is sensibly affected; and it is quite impossible to
get at any of his little wishes, in the way of memorials and messages--"

"How then, sir, came Sir Wycherly to honour _me_ with a request to visit
him?" demanded the other, with an extremely awkward pertinency.

"I suppose, sir, he has succeeded in muttering your name, and that a
natural construction has been put on its use, at such a moment. His will
has been made some time, I understand; though I am ignorant of even the
name of the executor, as it is closed in an envelope, and sealed with
Sir Wycherly's arms. It cannot be, then, on account of a _will_, that he
has wished to see you. I rather think, as the next of the family, _out
of the direct line of succession_, he may have ventured to name you as
the executor of the will in existence, and has thought it proper to
notify you of the same."

"Yes, sir," returned Sir Reginald, in his usual cold, wary manner;
"though it would have been more in conformity with usage, had the
notification taken the form of a request to serve, previously to making