e hands,--or rather the tongues,--through
which the calumny had made its way down to the Hall. He would at once go
to the Hall, and tell his uncle all the facts. He would describe the
gross ill-usage to which he had been subjected. No doubt he had left the
man sprawling upon the pavement, but there had been no sign that the man
had been dangerously hurt; and when two days afterward the man had
vanished, it was clear that he could not have vanished without legs. Had
he taken himself off,--as was probable,--then why need Harry trouble
himself as to his vanishing? If some one else had helped him in
escaping,--as was also probable,--why had not that some one come and told
the circumstances when all the inquiries were being made? Why should he
have been expected to speak of the circumstances of such an encounter,
which could not have been told but to Captain Scarborough's infinite
disgrace? And he could not have told of it without naming Florence
Mountjoy.

His uncle, when he heard the truth, must acknowledge that he had not
behaved badly. And yet Harry, as he turned it all in his mind was uneasy
as to his own conduct. He could not quite acquit himself in that he had
kept secret all the facts of that midnight encounter in the face of the
inquiries which had been made, in that he had falsely assured Augustus
Scarborough of his ignorance. And yet he knew that on no consideration
would he acknowledge himself to have been wrong.

CHAPTER XXIII.

THE RUMORS AS TO MR. PROSPER.

It was still October when Harry Annesley went down to Buston, and the
Mountjoys had just reached Brussels. Mr. Grey had made his visit to
Tretton and had returned to London. Harry went home on an
understanding,--on the part of his mother, at any rate,--that he should
remain there till Christmas. But he felt himself very averse to so long
a sojourn. If the Hall and park were open to him he might endure it. He
would take down two or three stiff books which he certainly would never
read, and would shoot a few pheasants, and possibly ride one of his
future brother-in-law's horses with the hounds. But he feared that there
was to be a quarrel by which he would be debarred from the Hall and the
park; and he knew, too, that it would not be well for him to shoot and
hunt when his income should have been cut off. It would be necessary
that some great step should be taken at once; but then it would be
necessary, also, that Florence should agree to that ste