the two attache's who were told off for the duty of
accompanying him was the hardest part of their allotted work. But other
gentlemen would lay themselves out to meet Sir Magnus and to ride with
him, and in this way he achieved that character for popularity which had
been a better aid to him in life than all the diplomatic skill which he
possessed.

"What do you think?" said he, walking off with Mrs. Mountjoy's letter
into his wife's room.

"I don't think anything, my dear."

"You never do." Lady Mountjoy, who had not yet undergone her painting,
looked cross and ill-natured. "At any rate, Sarah and her daughter are
proposing to come here."

"Good gracious! At once?"

"Yes, at once. Of course, I've asked them over and over again, and
something was said about this autumn, when we had come back from
Pimperingen."

"Why did you not tell me?"

"Bother! I did tell you. This kind of thing always turns up at last.
She's a very good kind of a woman, and the daughter is all that she
ought to be."

"Of course she'll be flirting with Anderson." Anderson was one of the
two mounted attaches.

"Anderson will know how to look after himself," said Sir Magnus. "At any
rate they must come. They have never troubled us before, and we ought to
put up with them once."

"But, my dear, what is all this about her brother?"

"She won't bring her brother with her."

"How can you be sure of that?" said the anxious lady.

"He is dying, and can't be moved."

"But that son of his--Mountjoy. It's altogether a most distressing
story. He turns out to be nobody after all, and now he has disappeared,
and the papers for an entire month were full of him. What would you do
if he were to turn up here? The girl was engaged to him, you know, and
has only thrown him off since his own father declared that he was not
legitimate. There never was such a mess about anything since London
first began."

Then Sir Magnus declared that, let Mountjoy Scarborough and his father
have misbehaved as they might, Mr. Scarborough's sister must be received
at Brussels. There was a little family difficulty. Sir Magnus had
borrowed three thousand pounds from the general which had been settled
on the general's widow, and the interest was not always paid with
extreme punctuality. To give Mrs. Mountjoy her due, it must be said that
this had not entered into her consideration when she had written to her
brother-in-law; but it was a burden to Sir Magnus, and had alwa