eral, gentlemanly spirit, with good principles, you
see, such as would not upset all we are doing for the hands.'

'What amount of capital do you mean?'

'Oh, from five hundred to a thousand! Or more would not come amiss. If
I only had it! What it would be to conduct an affair like that on true
principles! But luck is against me every way.'

Mark was at the sitting-room door as the four quarters began to strike
in preparation for eleven, but Lady Ronnisglen had been in her chair
for nearly half-an-hour, having been rapid and nervous enough to hurry
even the imperturbable maid, whom Annaple thought incapable of being
hastened. She was a little slight woman, with delicate features and
pale complexion, such as time deals with gently, and her once yellow
hair now softened with silver was turned back in bands beneath the
simple net cap that suited her so well. There was a soft yet sparkling
look about her as she held out her hands and exclaimed, 'Ah, Master
Mark, what mischief have you been doing?'

Mark came and knelt on one knee beside her and said: 'Will you let me
work for you both, Lady Ronnisglen? I will do my best to find some.'

'Ah! that is the point, my dear boy. I should have asked and wished
for definite work, if you had come to me before that discovery of
yours; and now it is a mere matter of necessity.'

'Yes,' said Mark; then, with some hesitation, he added: 'Lady
Ronnisglen, do you care whether I take to what people call a
gentleman's profession? I could, of course, go on till I am called to
the bar, and then wait for something to turn up; but that would be
waiting indeed! Then in other directions I've taken things easy, you
see, till I'm too old for examinations. I failed in the only one that
was still open to me. Lord Kirkaldy tried me for foreign office work,
and was appalled at my blunders. I'm not fit for a parson.'

'I should have thought you were.'

'Not I,' said Mark. 'I'm not up to the mark there. I couldn't say
honestly that I was called to it. I wish I could, for it would be the
easiest way out of it; but I looked at the service, and I can't.
There--that's a nice confession to come to you with! I can't think how
I can have been so impudent.'

'Mark, you are a dear good lad. I respect and honour you ever so much
more than before all this showed what stuff was in you! But the
question is, What's to be done? My child is verily the "penniless lass
with a high pedigree," for