s swagger. It was well for Mr Wentworth that he left the room
at once, and went cheerfully up-stairs to pay his respects to Mrs
Morgan. The Squire said, "Thank God!" quietly to himself when he got
out of the library. "Things are mending, surely--even Jack--even
Jack," Mr Wentworth said, under his breath; and the simple gentleman
said over a part of the general thanksgiving, as he went slowly, with
an unusual gladness, up the stair. He might not have entered Mrs
Morgan's drawing-room with such a relieved and brightened countenance
had he stayed ten minutes longer in the library, and listened to the
further conversation there.

CHAPTER XL.

"Now, Mr Wodehouse," said Jack Wentworth, "it appears that you and I
have a word to say to each other." They had all risen when the other
gentlemen followed Mr Morgan out of the room, and those who remained
stood in a group surrounding the unhappy culprit, and renewing his
impression of personal danger. When he heard himself thus addressed,
he backed against the wall, and instinctively took one of the chairs
and placed it before him. His furtive eye sought the door and the
window, investigating the chances of escape. When he saw that there
was none, he withdrew still a step further back, and stood at bay.

"By Jove! I aint going to stand all this," said Wodehouse; "as if
every fellow had a right to bully me--it's more than flesh and blood
can put up with. I don't care for that old fogey that's gone
up-stairs; but, by Jove! I won't stand any more from men that eat my
dinners, and win my money, and--"

Jack Wentworth made half a step forward with a superb smile--"My good
fellow, you should never reproach a man with his good actions," he said;
"but at the same time, having eaten your dinners, as you describe, I
have a certain claim on your gratitude. We have had some--a--business
connection--for some years. I don't say you have reason to be actually
grateful for that; but, at least, it brought you now and then into the
society of gentlemen. A man who robs a set of women, and leaves the poor
creature he has ruined destitute, is a sort of cur we have nothing to
say to," said the heir of the Wentworths, contemptuously. "We do not
pretend to be saints, but we are not blackguards; that is to say," said
Jack, with a perfectly calm and harmonious smile, "not in theory, nor in
our own opinion. The fact accordingly is, my friend, that you must
choose between _us_ and those respectable