g, and I think I could prove to you
it was _not_ his fault. Do, my dear friend, come here as soon
as you can, and let me explain to you whatever may have
seemed wrong. You cannot think how much we miss you. I feel
it a little hard that there should be strangers here this
evening--like Mr. Lankester and Mr. Barrington. But it could
not be helped. Mr. Lankester was speaking for Oliver last
night--and Mr. Barrington invited himself. I really don't
know why. Oliver is dreadfully tired--and so am I. The
ingratitude and ill-feeling of many of our neighbors has
tried me sorely. It will be a long time before I forget it.
It really seems as though nothing were worth striving for in
this very difficult world."

"Poor Lucy!" said Ferrier to himself, his heart softening, as usual.
"Barrington? H'm. That's odd." He had only time for a short reply:

"My dear Lady Lucy,--It's horrid that you are tired and
depressed. I wish I could come and cheer you up. Politics are
a cursed trade. But never mind, Oliver is safely in, and as
soon as the Government is formed, I will come to Tallyn, and
we will laugh at these woes. I can't write at greater length
now, for Broadstone has just summoned me. You will have seen
that he went to Windsor this morning. Now the agony begins.
Let's hope it may be decently short. I am just off for town.

"Yours ever, John Ferrier."

Two days passed--three days--and still the "agony" lasted. Lord
Broadstone's house in Portman Square was besieged all day by anxious
journalists watching the goings and comings of a Cabinet in the making.
But nothing could be communicated to the newspapers--nothing, in fact,
was settled. Envoys went backward and forward to Lord Philip in
Northamptonshire. Urgent telegrams invited him to London. He took no
notice of the telegrams; he did not invite the envoys, and when they
came he had little or nothing of interest to say to them. Lord
Broadstone, he declared, was fully in possession of his views. He had
nothing more to add. And, indeed, a short note from him laid by in the
new Premier's pocket-book was, if the truth were known, the _fons et
origo_ of all Lord Broadstone's difficulties.

Meanwhile the more conservative section exerted itself, and by the
evening of the third day it seemed to have triumphed. A rumor spread
abroad that Lord Philip had gone too far. Ferrier emerged