ther which made Harry's flesh creep. He could not but think
of his own father and his own mother, and his feelings in regard to
them. But here this man was talking of the misdoings of the one parent
and the other with the most perfect _sang-froid._ "Of course I
understand all that," said Harry.

"There is a manner of doing evil so easy and indifferent as absolutely
to quell the general feeling respecting it. A man shall tell you that he
has committed a murder in a tone so careless as to make you feel that a
murder is nothing. I don't suppose my father can be punished for his
attempt to rob me of twenty thousand a year, and therefore he talks to
me about it as though it were a good joke. Not only that, but he expects
me to receive it in the same way. Upon the whole, he prevails. I find
myself not in the least angry with him, and rather obliged to him than
otherwise for allowing me to be his eldest son."

"What must Mountjoy's feelings be!" said Harry.

"Exactly; what must be Mountjoy's feelings! There is no need to consider
my father's, but poor Mountjoy's! I don't suppose that he can be dead."

"I should think not."

"While a man is alive he can carry himself off, but when a fellow is
dead it requires at least one or probably two to carry him. Men do not
wish to undertake such a work secretly unless they've been concerned in
the murder; and then there will have been a noise which must have been
heard, or blood which must have been seen, and the body will at last be
forthcoming, or some sign of its destruction. I do not think he be
dead."

"I should hope not," said Harry, rather tamely, and feeling that he was
guilty of a falsehood by the manner in which he expressed his hope.

"When was it you saw him last?" Scarborough asked the question with an
abruptness which was predetermined, but which did not quite take Harry
aback.

"About three months since--in London," said Harry, going back in his
memory to the last meeting, which had occurred before the squire had
declared his purpose.

"Ah;--you haven't seen him, then, since he knew that he was nobody?" This
he asked in an indifferent tone, being anxious not to discover his
purpose, but in doing so he gave Harry great credit for his readiness of
mind.

"I have not seen him since he heard the news which must have astonished
him more than any one else."

"I wonder," said Augustus, "how Florence Mountjoy has borne it?"

"Neither have I seen her. I have been at C