amily,
especially with a countess-aunt in the neighbourhood, and quoted Lord
Eldon's saying that to make a good lawyer of one, it was needful for
him to have spent both his own and his wife's fortune to begin with,
but he allowed that young Mr. Egremont was a very favourable specimen,
and was resolutely applying himself to his work, and that he himself
felt it due to him to give all the assistance possible.

Miss Headworth, he could not deny, had aged, but far less than Mrs.
Nugent in the past year, and it really was a great comfort to Miss Mary
to have the old ladies together. He told too how the mission, now
lately over, had stirred the Micklethwayte folk into strong excitement,
and how good works had been undertaken, evil habits renounced,
reconciliations effected, religious services frequented. Would it last?
Nobody, he said, had taken it up so zealously as Gerard Godfrey, who
seemed as if he would fain throw everything up, and spend his whole
life in some direct service as a home missionary or something of the
kind. 'He is a good fellow,' said Mr. Dutton, 'and it is quite
genuine, but I made him wait at least a year, that he may be sure that
this is not only a passing impulse.'

Nuttie thought that she knew what was the impulse that had actuated
him, and felt a pleasant elation and self-consciousness even while she
repressed a sigh of pity for herself and for him. Altogether the dip
into the Micklethwayte world was delightful, but when Mr. Dutton began
to ask Nuttie what she had seen, she burst out with, 'Nothing--nothing
but just a walk and a drive in the Bois de Boulogne;' and her mother
explained that 'in Mr. Egremont's state of health,' etc.

'I wonder,' asked Mr. Dutton, 'if I might be allowed--'

Nuttie's eyes sparkled with ecstasy.

It ended in her mother, who had been wondering how Mr. Egremont could
be amused all the long evening, arranging that Mr. Dutton should come
in an hour's time to call on him, on the chance of being admitted, and
that then the offer might be made when she had prepared him for it,
advising Nuttie to wait in her own room. She was beginning to learn
how to steer between her husband and her daughter, and she did not
guess that her old friend was sacrificing one of the best French plays
for the chance.

It turned out well; Mr. Egremont was conscious of a want of variety. He
demanded whether it was the young fellow, and being satisfied on that
part, observed in almost a good-h