house?"

"It is that I may hear you, father, speak among men."

"Nay," said he, laughing, "thou mayst hear me better speak among men
at King's Court in the City. There I can hold my own well enough,
but with these young men over their wine, I shall have but little to
say, I fancy. If thou hast nothing to gain but to hear thy old father
talk, the time and money will be surely thrown away."

"I would hear him talk, father."

"The young lord?"

"Yes; the young lord. He is bright and clever, and, coming from
another world than our world, can tell me things that I do not know."

"Can he tell thee aught that is good?"

"From what I hear of him from our friend he will tell me, I think,
naught that is bad. You will be there to hear, and to arrest his
words if they be evil. But I think him to be one from whose mouth no
guile or folly will be heard."

"Who art thou, my child, that thou shouldst be able to judge whether
words of guile are likely to come from a young man's lips?" But this
he said smiling and pressing her hand while he seemed to rebuke her.

"Nay, father; I do not judge. I only say that I think it might be
so. They are not surely all false and wicked. But if you wish it
otherwise I will not utter another syllable to urge the request."

"We will go, Marion. Thy friend urged that it is not good that thou
shouldst always be shut up with me alone. And, though I may distrust
the young lord as not knowing him, my confidence in thee is such
that I think that nothing will ever shake it." And so it was settled
that they should all go. He would send to a livery stable and hire a
carriage for this unusual occasion. There should be no need for the
young lord to send them home. Though he did not know, as he said,
much of the ways of the outside world, it was hardly the custom for
the host to supply carriages as well as viands. When he dined, as he
did annually, with the elder Mr. Pogson, Mr. Pogson sent him home in
no carriage. He would sit at the lord's table, but he would go and
come as did other men.

On the Friday named the two ladies and the two men arrived at Hendon
Hall in something more than good time. Hampstead hopped and skipped
about as though he were delighted as a boy might have been at their
coming. It may be possible that there was something of guile even
in this, and that he had calculated that he might thus best create
quickly that intimacy with the Quaker and his daughter which he felt
to be neces