not know how I could serve them. I
shall be busy just now, but I will give you the cheque. And if you
and Emily have nothing better to do, come and dine to-morrow." Lopez
with real tears in his eyes took the cheque, and promised to come on
the morrow. "And in the meantime I wish you would see Everett." Of
course he promised that he would see Everett.

Again he was exalted, on this occasion not so much by the acquisition
of the money as by the growing conviction that his father-in-law was
a cow capable of being milked. And the quarrel between Everett and
his father might clearly be useful to him. He might either serve the
old man by reducing Everett to proper submission, or he might manage
to creep into the empty space which the son's defection would make
in the father's heart and the father's life. He might at any rate
make himself necessary to the old man, and become such a part of the
household in Manchester Square as to be indispensable. Then the old
man would every day become older and more in want of assistance. He
thought that he saw the way to worm himself into confidence, and,
soon, into possession. The old man was not a man of iron as he had
feared, but quite human, and if properly managed, soft and malleable.

He saw Sexty Parker in the city that day, and used his cheque for
L500 in some triumphant way, partly cajoling and partly bullying his
poor victim. To Sexty also he had to tell his own story about the row
down at Silverbridge. He had threatened to thrash the fellow in the
street, and the fellow had not dared to come out of his house without
a policeman. Yes;--he had lost his election. The swindling of those
fellows at Silverbridge had been too much for him. But he flattered
himself that he had got the better of Master Fletcher. That was the
tone in which he told the story to his friend in the city.

Then, before dinner, he found Everett at the club. Everett Wharton
was to be found there now almost every day. His excuse to himself lay
in the political character of the institution. The club intended to
do great things,--to find Liberal candidates for all the boroughs and
counties in England which were not hitherto furnished, and then to
supply the candidates with money. Such was the great purpose of the
Progress. It had not as yet sent out many candidates or collected
much money. As yet it was, politically, almost quiescent. And
therefore Everett Wharton, whose sense of duty took him there, spent
his af