they are. We must expect it. Do you
mean they look older than they are?"

"Yes--older, and--and more----"

"Well?"

He looked at her sharply, for she could not quite command her voice, and
left the sentence unfinished. Then Sydney had an uncomfortable feeling.
He saw that there was something amiss, but did not care at the moment to
insist on further confidences. No doubt he would hear all that there was
to be said by and by. Meanwhile he turned the conversation, and soon
contrived to interest her, so that they reached the Rectory in excellent
spirits. All that day poor Lettice alternated between despair and giddy
lightness of heart.

So the hero came home and was feasted, and his father and mother did
obeisance to him, and even he for an hour or two thought it good that he
should now and then renew his contract with the earth from which he
sprang, and remember the chains of duty and affection which bound him to
the past, instead of dwelling constantly in the present and the future.

Throughout dinner, and at dessert, and as they drank the wine which
Lettice had provided, Sydney spoke of his position and prospects,
dazzling those who listened to him with his pictures of victory at
Dormer, of Conservative triumphs all along the line, of Ministerial
favor for himself, of "Office--why not?--within a twelvemonth." It would
have been treason for any of his audience to doubt that all these good
things would come to pass. If Lettice felt that there was a skeleton at
the feast, her father at any rate had forgotten its existence. Or,
rather, he saw deliverance at hand. The crisis of his boy's fortune had
arrived; and, if Sydney triumphed, nothing that could happen to Sydney's
father could rob Mr. Campion of his joy.

At last the women left the room, and Sydney proceeded to tell his father
what he wanted. He must return to town by the first train in the
morning, having made an appointment with Mr. Maltman for two o'clock. Of
course he meant to contest Dormer; but it was desirable that he should
know for certain that he could raise five hundred pounds within a week,
to supplement his own narrow means.

His face fell a little when his father confessed--as though it were
clearly a matter for shame and remorse--that he could not so much as
draw a cheque for twenty pounds. But, in fact, he was not surprised.
Recklessly as he had abstained from inquiring into the old man's affairs
since Lettice spoke to him in London two years a