oing it? He should be informed at once."

"There is time enough for that," said George Morris.

"If you will not I must," replied Ralph.

The telegram was at once sent in duplicate, addressed to that other
Ralph,--Ralph who was declared by the Squire's son to be once more
Ralph the heir,--addressed to him both at his lodgings in London and
at the Moonbeam. When the messenger had been sent to the nearest
railway station with the message, Ralph and his friend started for
Newton Priory together. Poor Ralph still wore his boots and breeches
and the red coat in which he had ridden on the former fatal day, and
in which he had passed the night by the side of his dying father's
bed. On their journey homeward they met Gregory, who had heard of the
accident, and had at once started to see his uncle.

"It is all over!" said Ralph. Gregory, who was in his gig, dropped
the reins and sat in silence. "It is all done. Let us get on, George.
It is horrid to me to be in this coat. Get on quickly. Yes, indeed;
everything is done now."

He had lost a father who had loved him dearly, and whom he had dearly
loved,--a father whose opportunities of showing his active love had
been greater even than fall to the lot of most parents. A father
gives naturally to his son, but the Squire had been almost unnatural
in his desire to give. There had never been a more devoted father,
one more intensely anxious for his son's welfare;--and Ralph had
known this, and loved his father accordingly. Nevertheless, he could
not keep himself from remembering that he had now lost more than
a father. The estate as to which the Squire had been so full of
interest,--as to which he, Ralph, had so constantly endeavoured to
protect himself from an interest that should be too absorbing,--had
in the last moment escaped him. And now, in this sad and solemn hour,
he could not keep himself from thinking of that loss. As he had stood
in the room in which the dead body of his father had been lying, he
had cautioned himself against this feeling. But still he had known
that it had been present to him. Let him do what he would with his
own thoughts, he could not hinder them from running back to the fact
that by his father's sudden death he had lost the possession of the
Newton estate. He hated himself for remembering such a fact at such a
time, but he could not keep himself from remembering it. His father
had fought a life-long battle to make him the heir of Newton, and had