t envoy at Naples, or was it necessary that the dignity and honor
of England should be maintained by an essenced old fop, whose social
successes--and we never heard that he had any other--date from the early
days of the Regency?'"

Lord Culduff was pacing his room angrily when Temple entered, and,
although nothing would have induced him to show the insolent paragraph
of the paper, he burst out into a violent abuse of those meddlesome
Radicals, whose whole mission in life was to assail men of family and
station.

"In the famous revolution of France, sir," cried he, "they did their
work with the guillotine; but our cowardly canaille never rise above
defamation. You must write to the papers about this, Temple. You must
expose this system of social assassination, or the day will come, if it
has not already come, when gentlemen of birth and blood will refuse to
serve the Crown."

"I came back to tell you that our man has made his escape," said
Temple, half trembling at daring to interrupt this flow of indignation.

"And whom do you call our man, sir?" "I mean Rogers--the fellow we have
been writing about."

"How and when has this happened?"

Temple proceeded to repeat what he had learned at the prefecture of the
police, and read out the words of the telegram.

"Let us see," said Lord Culduff, seating himself in a well-cushioned
chair. "Let us see what new turn this will give the affair. He may be
recaptured, or he may be, most probably is, drowned. We then come in for
compensation. They must indemnify. There are few claims so thoroughly
chronic in their character as those for an indemnity. You first discuss
the right, and you then higgle over the arithmetic. I don't want to go
back to town this season. See to it then, Temple, that we reserve this
question entirely to ourselves. Let Blagden refer everything to us."

"They have sent the news home already."

"Oh! they have. Very sharp practice. Not peculiar for any extreme
delicacy either. But I cannot dine with Blagden, for all that. This
escape gives a curious turn to the whole affair. Let us look into it a
little. I take it the fellow must have gone down--eh?"

"Most probably."

"Or he might have been picked up by some passing steamer or by a
fishing-boat. Suppose him to have got free, he 'll get back to England,
and make capital out of the adventure. These fellows understand all that
nowadays."

Temple, seeing a reply was expected, assented.

"So that we mu