s. Luttrell asked him with any such notion,"
returned Rupert. "She merely wanted him to spend a few days with her at
Netherglen."

"Has she much to leave? I thought the estates were entailed," said
Percival.

"She has a rather large private fortune. I expected to find that you
knew all about it," said Rupert, with a smile.

"It's the last thing that I should concern myself about," said Percival,
superbly. And Vivian was almost sorry that he had made the remark, for
it overset all the remains of his friend's good temper, and brought into
ugly prominence the upright, black mark upon his forehead caused by his
too frequent frown.

Matters were not mended when Rupert asked, by way of changing the
conversation, whether Percival's marriage were to take place on Miss
Murray's return to England.

"Marriage? No! What are you thinking of?" said he, starting up
impatiently. "Don't you know that our engagement--such, as it is--is a
profound secret from the world in general? You are nearly the only
person who knows anything about it outside our own family; and even
there it isn't talked about. Marriage! I only wish there was a chance of
it. But she is in no hurry to give up her liberty; and I can't press
her."

And then he took his departure, with an injured feeling that Rupert had
not been very sympathetic.

"I've a good mind to offer to go with him," said Mr. Vivian to himself
when his friend was gone. "I should like to see them all again; I should
like to enjoy the Italian sunshine and the fresh, sweet air with Kitty,
and hear her innocent little comments on the remains of mediaeval art
that her father is sure to be raving about. But it is better not. I
might forget myself some day. I might say what could not be unsaid. And
then, poor, little Kitty, it would be hard both for you and for me. No,
I won't go. Stay in Italy and get married, Kitty: that is the best thing
for us both. You will have forgotten your old friend by the time you
come back to London; and I shall drag on at the old round, with the same
weary, clanking chain at my heels which nobody suspects. Good God!"
cried Rupert, with a sudden burst of passion which would have startled
the friends who had seen in him nothing but the perfectly
self-possessed, cold-natured, well-mannered man of the world, "what a
fool a man can make of himself in his youth, and repent it all his life
afterwards in sackcloth and ashes--yet repent it in vain--in vain!"

Percival Hero