u have had my reply."

With that, he seated himself doggedly in a corner of the room;
waiting--ostentatiously waiting--for his mother and his brother to take
their leave. The position was serious. To argue the matter with him that
night was hopeless. To invite Sir Patrick's interference would only be
to provoke his savage temper to a new outbreak. On the other hand, to
leave the helpless woman, after what had passed, without another effort
to befriend her, was, in her situation, an act of downright inhumanity,
and nothing less. Julius took the one way out of the difficulty that was
left--the one way worthy of him as a compassionate and an honorable man.

"We will drop it for to-night, Geoffrey," he said. "But I am not the
less resolved, in spite of all that you have said, to return to the
subject to-morrow. It would save me some inconvenience--a second journey
here from town, and then going back again to my engagements--if I staid
with you to-night. Can you give me a bed?"

A look flashed on him from Anne, which thanked him as no words could
have thanked him.

"Give you a bed?" repeated Geoffrey. He checked himself, on the point
of refusing. His mother was watching him; his wife was watching him--and
his wife knew that the room above them was a room to spare. "All right!"
he resumed, in another tone, with his eye on his mother. "There's my
empty room up stairs. Have it, if you like. You won't find I've changed
my mind to-morrow--but that's your look-out. Stop here, if the fancy
takes you. I've no objection. It don't matter to Me.--Will you trust his
lordship under my roof?" he added, addressing his mother. "I might have
some motive that I'm hiding from you, you know!" Without waiting for an
answer, he turned to Anne. "Go and tell old Dummy to put the sheets
on the bed. Say there's a live lord in the house--she's to send in
something devilish good for supper!" He burst fiercely into a forced
laugh. Lady Holchester rose at the moment when Anne was leaving the
room. "I shall not be here when you return," she said. "Let me bid you
good-night."

She shook hands with Anne--giving her Sir Patrick's note, unseen, at the
same moment. Anne left the room. Without addressing another word to her
second son, Lady Holchester beckoned to Julius to give her his arm. "You
have acted nobly toward your brother," she said to him. "My one comfort
and my one hope, Julius, are in you." They went out together to the
gate, Geoffrey followin