Mr. Greenwood.

"Even that wouldn't be much if he were to be married first," said the
Marchioness.

Every day she went to her husband for half-an-hour before her
lunch, at which time the nurse who attended him during the day was
accustomed to go to her dinner. He had had a physician down from
London since his son had visited him, and the physician had told
the Marchioness that though there was not apparently any immediate
danger, still the symptoms were such as almost to preclude a hope of
ultimate recovery. When this opinion had been pronounced there had
arisen between the Marchioness and the chaplain a discussion as to
whether Lord Hampstead should be once again summoned. The Marquis
himself had expressed no such wish. A bulletin of a certain fashion
had been sent three or four times a week to Hendon Hall purporting
to express the doctor's opinion of the health of their noble patient;
but the bulletin had not been scrupulously true. Neither of the two
conspirators had wished to have Lord Hampstead at Trafford Park. Lady
Kingsbury was anxious to make the separation complete between her own
darlings and their brother, and Mr. Greenwood remembered, down to
every tittle of a word and tone, the insolence of the rebuke which he
had received from the heir. But if Lord Kingsbury were really to be
dying, then they would hardly dare to keep his son in ignorance.

"I've got something I'd better show you," she said, as she seated
herself by her husband's sofa. Then she proceeded to read to him the
letter, without telling him as she did so that it was anonymous. When
he had heard the first paragraph he demanded to know the name of the
writer. "I'd better read it all first," said the Marchioness. And she
did read it all to the end, closing it, however, without mentioning
the final "Well-Wisher." "Of course it's anonymous," she said, as she
held the letter in her hand.

"Then I don't believe a word of it," said the Marquis.

"Very likely not; but yet it sounds true."

"I don't think it sounds true at all. Why should it be true? There is
nothing so wicked as anonymous letters."

"If it isn't true about Hampstead it's true at any rate of Fanny.
That man comes from Holloway, and Paradise Row and the 'Duchess of
Edinburgh.' Where Fanny goes for her lover, Hampstead is likely to
follow. 'Birds of a feather flock together.'"

"I won't have you speak of my children in that way," said the sick
lord.

"What can I do? Is it not t