arry had been his heir, and therefore the
nearest; but that now he had been repudiated? But it was of course
resolved that Mrs. Annesley should go to the Hall at the hour indicated
on the morrow.

"Oh yes; I'm up here; where else should I be,--unless you expected to
find me in my bed?" It was thus that he answered his sister's first
inquiry as to his condition.

"In bed? Oh no! Why should any one expect to find you in bed, Peter?"

"Never call me by that name again!" he said, rising up from his chair,
and standing erect, with one arm stretched out. She called him Peter,
simply because it had been her custom so to do during the period of
nearly fifty years in which they had lived in the same parish as brother
and sister. She could, therefore, only stare at him and his tragic
humor, as he stood there before her. "Though of course it is madness on
my part to object to it! My godfather and godmother christened me Peter,
and our father was Peter before me, and his father too was Peter
Prosper. But that woman has made the name sound abominable in my ears."

"Miss Thoroughbung, you mean?"

"She came here, and so be-Petered me in my own house,--nay, up in this
very room,--that I hardly knew whether I was on my head or my heels."

"I would not mind what she said. They all know that she is a little
flighty."

"Nobody told me so. Why couldn't you let me know that she was flighty
beforehand? I thought that she was a person whom it would have done to
marry."

"If you will only think of it, Peter--" Here he shuddered visibly. "I
beg your pardon, I will not call you so again. But it is unreasonable to
blame us for not telling you about Miss Thoroughbung."

"Of course it is. I am unreasonable, I know it."

"Let us hope that it is all over now."

"Cart-ropes wouldn't drag me up to the hymeneal altar,--at least not with
that woman."

"You have sent for me, Peter--I beg pardon. I was so glad when you sent.
I would have come before, only I was afraid that you would be annoyed.
Is there anything that we can do for you?"

"Nothing at all that you can do, I fear."

"Somebody told us that you were thinking of going abroad." Here he shook
his head. "I think it was Harry." Here he shook his head and frowned.
"Had you not some idea of going abroad?"

"That is all gone," he said, solemnly.

"It would have enabled you to get over this disappointment without
feeling it so acutely."

"I do feel it; but not exactly the disappoint