ssed his visitor easily indeed, but not
discourteously.

'How do you do, Mr. Eldon? I'm glad to see that you are so much better.
Will you sit down? I think you know Mr. Rodman, at all events by name?'

Hubert assented by gesture. He had come prepared for disagreeable
things in this his first meeting with Mutimer, but the honour of an
introduction to the latter's friends had not been included in his
anticipations. Mr. Rodman had risen and bowed slightly. His smile
carried a disagreeable suggestion from which Mutimer's behaviour was
altogether free; he rather seemed to enjoy the situation.

For a moment there was silence and embarrassment. Richard overcame the
difficulty.

'Come and dine with me to-night, will you?' he said to Rodman. 'Here,
take this plan with you, and think it over.'

'Pray don't let me interfere with your business,' interposed Hubert,
with scrupulous politeness. 'I could see you later, Mr. Mutimer.'

'No, no; Rodman and I have done for the present,' said Mutimer,
cheerfully. 'By-the-by,' he added, as his right-hand man moved to the
door, 'don't forget to drop a line to Slater and Smith. And, I say, if
Hogg turns up before two o'clock, send him here; I'll be down with you
by half-past.'

Mr. Rodman gave an 'All right,' nodded to Hubert, who paid no attention,
and took his departure.

'You've had a long pull of it,' Richard began, as he took his chair
again, and threw his legs into an easy position. 'Shall I close the
windows? Maybe you don't like the draught.'

'Thank you; I feel no draught.'

The working man had the advantage as yet. Hubert in vain tried to be
at ease, whilst Mutimer was quite himself, and not ungraceful in
his assumption of equality. For one thing, Hubert could not avoid
a comparison between his own wasted frame and the other's splendid
physique; it heightened the feeling of antagonism which possessed him in
advance, and provoked the haughtiness he had resolved to guard against.
The very lineaments of the men foretold mutual antipathy. Hubert's
extreme delicacy of feature was the outward expression of a character
so compact of subtleties and refinements, of high prejudice and jealous
sensibility, of spiritual egoism and all-pervading fastidiousness,
that it was impossible for him not to regard with repugnance a man who
represented the combative principle, even the triumph, of the uncultured
classes. He was no hidebound aristocrat; the liberal tendencies of his
intellect l