nishment were augmented into
stupefaction. He was scarcely capable of speech. He found himself
wondering idly how heinous a crime a man must commit to be branded
ineligible.

"To explain this to you," Brooks continued, "I am bound to tell you
something which is only known to two people in the country. The Marquis
of Arranmore is my father."

Mr. Bullsom dropped his cigar from between his fingers, and it lay for
a moment smouldering upon the carpet. His face was a picture of blank
and hopeless astonishment.

"God bless my soul!" he exclaimed, faintly. "You mean that you--you,
Kingston Brooks, the lawyer, are Lord Arranmore's son?"

Brooks nodded.

"Yes! It's not a pleasant story. My father deserted my mother when I
was a child, and she died in his absence. A few months ago, Lord
Arranmore, in a leisurely sort of way, thought well to find me out, and
after treating me as an acquaintance for some time--a sort of
probationary period, I suppose--he told me the truth. That is the
reason of my resigning from the firm of Morrison and Brooks almost as
soon as the partnership deed was signed. I went to see Mr. Ascough and
told him about your offer, and he, of course, explained the position to
me."

"But,"--Mr. Bullsom paused as though striving to straighten out the
matter in his own mind, "but if you are Lord Arranmore's son there is no
secret about it, is there? Why do you still call yourself Mr. Brooks?"

Mr. Bullsom, whose powers of observation were not remarkably acute,
looking steadily into his visitor's face, saw there some signs of a
certain change which others had noticed and commented upon during the
last few months--a hardening of expression and a slight contraction of
the mouth. For Brooks had spent many sleepless nights pondering upon
this new problem which had come into his life.

"I do not feel inclined," he said, quietly, "for many reasons, to accept
the olive-branch which it has pleased my father to hold out to me after
all these years. I have still some faint recollections of the close of
my mother's life--hastened, I am sure, by anxiety and sorrow on his
account. I remember my own bringing up, the loneliness of it. I
remember many things which Lord Arranmore would like me now to forget.
Then, too, my father and I are as far apart as the poles. He has not
the least sympathy with my pursuits or the things which I find worth
doing in life. There are other reasons which I need not trouble you
with. It is