come to the uncles
before long. Miss Wilson, I desire to warn you against marrying a young
man of 'the classes.' They have no morals, but they have always uncles."

Miss Wilson's eyes shot laughter at her _fiance_. "Go on, Bobbie, and
don't make it too long!"

"I decline to be hustled." Bobbie's tone was firm, though urbane. "I
repeat: I went to my uncle. And I said to him, like the unemployed:
'Find me work, and none of your d----d charity!'"

"Which means, I suppose, that the last time you went to him, you
borrowed fifty pounds?" said Sir James.

"I shouldn't dream, sir, of betraying my uncle's affairs. On this
occasion--for an uncle--he behaved well. He lectured me for twenty-seven
minutes and a half--I had made up my mind beforehand not to let it go
over the half-hour--and then he came to business. After a year's
training and probation in Berlin he thought he could get me a post in
his brother-in-law's place in the City. Awfully warm thing, you know,"
said Bobbie, complacently; "worth a little trouble. So I told him,
kindly, I'd think of it. Ecco!" He pointed to the letter. "Of course, I
told my uncle I should permit him to continue my allowance, and in a
year I shall be a merchant prince--in the egg; I shall be worth
marrying; and I shall allow Ettie two hundred a year for her clothes."

"And Lady Niton?"

Bobbie sat down abruptly; the girl stared at the carpet.

"I don't see the point of your remark," said Bobbie at last, with
mildness. "When last I had the honor of hearing of her, Lady Niton was
taking the air--or the waters--at Strathpeffer."

"As far as I know," remarked Sir James, "she is staying with the
Feltons, five miles off, at this moment."

Bobbie whistled. "Close quarters!" He looked at Miss Ettie Wilson, and
she at him. "May I ask whether, as soon as Ettie and I invited ourselves
for the day, you asked Lady Niton to come to tea?"

"Not at all. I never play Providence unless I'm told to do so. Only Miss
Mallory is coming to tea."

Bobbie expressed pleasure at the prospect; then his amiable
countenance--the face of an "Idle Apprentice," whom no god has the heart
to punish--sobered to a real concern as the association of ideas led him
to inquire what the latest news might be of Oliver Marsham.

Sir James shook his head; his look clouded. He understood from Lady Lucy
that Oliver was no better; the accounts, in fact, were very bad.

"Did they arrest anybody?" asked Bobbie.

"At Hartingfie