lively
discussion apropos of the silent tilt at the dinner-table, his sister
pleading for a return to the old ways, and a release from such state and
ceremony. "At least while we are by ourselves, mamma. Anyway, I know
David will just hate it, and I don't see what good a title is if we must
become perfect slaves to it."

David crossed the room and sat down before the piano. "How strange this
old place seems without the others--Bob, and the cousins, and uncle
himself! We weren't admitted often--but--"

"Sh--sh--" said Laura, who had followed him and stood at his ride.
"Don't remind mamma. She remembers too much--all the time. Play the
'King's Hunting Jig,' David. Remember how you used to play it for me
every evening after dinner, when I was a girl?"

"Do I remember? Rather! I have done nothing with the piano since
then--when you were a girl. I'll play it for you now, while you are a
girl."

"But I really am grown up now, David. It's quite absurd for me to go
about like this. It's only because mamma chooses to have it so. She even
keeps a governess for me still."

"To her you are a child, and to me you are still a girl, and a mighty
fine one."

"It's so good to have you back, David! You haven't forgotten the Jig!
Where's your flute? Get it, and I'll accompany you. I can drum a little
now--after a fashion. We'll let them talk."

So they amused themselves for the rest of the evening with music, and
Lady Thryng's face lost the strained and harassed expression it had worn
all during dinner, and took on a look of contentment. After this the
days were spent by David in going over his uncle's large mass of papers
and correspondence, with the aid of Mr. Stretton and a secretary. A
colossal task it proved to be.

No one, even his lawyer, who had his confidence more than any one else,
knew in what the old Lord Thryng's wealth really consisted, although Mr.
Stretton surmised much of his surplus income of late years had been
placed in Africa. As his papers had not been set in order or tabulated
for years, every note, land loan, mortgage, and rental had to be
unearthed slowly and laboriously from among a mass of written matter and
figures, more or less worthless; for the old lord had a habit of saving
every scrap of paper--the backs of notes and letters--for summing up
accounts and jotting down memoranda and dates.

Certain hours of each day David devoted to this labor, collecting his
papers in a small room opening off fro