brief and decided; he was now almost imperious.

'I believe it will be in a moment, sir,' was the reply, marked, perhaps,
by just a little failure in the complete subservience expected.

Hubert looked at the man for an instant with contracted brows, but
merely said--'Tell them to be quick.'

The man returned in less than three minutes with a satisfactory
announcement, and Eldon went upstairs to refresh himself.

Two hours later he had dined, with obvious lack of appetite, and was
deriving but slight satisfaction from a cigar, when the servant entered
with a message from Mrs. Eldon: she desired to see her son.

Hubert threw his cigar aside, and made a gesture expressing his wish to
be led to his mother's room. The man conducted him to the landing at the
head of the first flight of stairs; there a female servant was waiting,
who, after a respectful movement, led the way to a door at a few yards'
distance. She opened it and drew back. Hubert passed into the room.

It was furnished in a very old-fashioned style--heavily, richly, and
with ornaments seemingly procured rather as evidences of wealth than of
taste; successive Mrs. Eldons had used it as a boudoir. The present lady
of that name sat in a great chair near the fire. Though not yet fifty,
she looked at least ten years older; her hair had streaks of white, and
her thin delicate features were much lined and wasted. It would not be
enough to say that she had evidently once been beautiful, for in truth
she was so still, with a spiritual beauty of a very rare type. Just now
her face was set in a sternness which did not seem an expression natural
to it; the fine lips were much more akin to smiling sweetness, and the
brows accepted with repugnance anything but the stamp of thoughtful
charity.

After the first glance at Hubert she dropped her eyes. He, stepping
quickly across the floor, put his lips to her cheek; she did not move
her head, nor raise her hand to take his.

'Will you sit there, Hubert?' she said, pointing to a chair which
was placed opposite hers. The resemblance between her present mode of
indicating a wish and her son's way of speaking to the servant below was
very striking; even the quality of their voices had much in common, for
Hubert's was rather high-pitched. In face, however, the young man did
not strongly evidence their relation to each other: he was not handsome,
and had straight low brows, which made his aspect at first forbidding.

'Why hav