self now and then out of his old
lexicon to the meaning of some word which had flown to Erebus. Yes,
Eustace was a fellow for the heights and depths!

He said quietly:

"You don't care to talk about it, I suppose?"

Miltoun shook his head, and again there was silence.

The buzzard hawk having seen them move, quivered his wings like a moth's,
and deserted that plane of air. A robin from the dappled warmth of a
mossy stone, was regarding them instead. There was another splash in the
pool.

Lord Dennis said gently:

"That fellow's risen twice; I believe he'd take a 'Wistman's treasure.'"
Extracting from his hat its latest fly, and binding it on, he began
softly to swish his line.

"I shall have him yet!" he muttered. But Miltoun had stolen away....

The further piece of information about Mrs. Noel, already known by
Barbara, and diffused by the 'Bucklandbury News', had not become common
knowledge at the Court till after Lord Dennis had started out to fish.
In combination with the report that Miltoun had arrived and gone out
without breakfast, it had been received with mingled feelings. Bertie,
Harbinger, and Shropton, in a short conclave, after agreeing that from
the point of view of the election it was perhaps better than if she had
been a divorcee, were still inclined to the belief that no time was to be
lost--in doing what, however, they were unable to determine. Apart from
the impossibility of knowing how a fellow like Miltoun would take the
matter, they were faced with the devilish subtlety of all situations to
which the proverb 'Least said, soonest mended' applies. They were in the
presence of that awe-inspiring thing, the power of scandal. Simple
statements of simple facts, without moral drawn (to which no legal
exception could be taken) laid before the public as pieces of interesting
information, or at the worst exposed in perfect good faith, lest the
public should blindly elect as their representative one whose private
life might not stand the inspection of daylight--what could be more
justifiable! And yet Miltoun's supporters knew that this simple
statement of where he spent his evenings had a poisonous potency, through
its power of stimulating that side of the human imagination the most
easily excited. They recognized only too well, how strong was a certain
primitive desire, especially in rural districts, by yielding to which the
world was made to go, and how remarkably hard it, was not to yiel