rmly to his own view of the bargain, and though there was the same
friendship between them as ever, and Mr. Walpole prayed over the
business in our house, they could by no means come to terms.

Things stood at this pass, and I was sorely impatient with it all,
when, as I have said, my cousin Rupert arrived, and, for good or evil,
gave my life a far different turn.

As soon as my father had seen to it that the cloth was laid for four,
and sent down the maid with orders to fill a jug from the barrel on
the right-hand side of the cellar door, he turned to Rupert.

"You shall taste your father's brewing," he said. "I trust all is well
with him?"

"I have no doubt it is, and I am much obliged to you, sir," answered
he carelessly. "To tell you the truth, I have not yet found my way to
Lynn."

"What, nephew! Have you come here before paying your respects to your
own father?"

"I am afraid it is even so; and I will not pay you so poor a
compliment as to remark that Brandon Grange lies forty miles nearer to
Yarmouth than King's Lynn."

"Fie, young man, I am ashamed to hear you! I doubt whether I ought to
have let you cross my threshold if I had known of this. Jessica," he
added, turning to my mother, "here is a youth who comes to pay you a
visit before he has so much as set eyes on Lynn brewery, after three
years!"

And thrice during the evening he returned to the same subject, each
time rating master Rupert soundly for his filial neglect, and pointing
out the many advantages which his father's rich house at Lynn had over
what it pleased him to call the homely grange of Brandon.

He questioned Rupert while we supped concerning his adventures, and
what quarter of the world he had been in. But as to this my cousin
maintained a singular reserve, merely stating that he had spent most
of the time on a voyage round the Cape of Good Hope to the factories
of the great East India Company, of Leadenhall Street in the City of
London.

All this time I listened, saying nothing, for it was not my father's
custom to permit me to speak in his presence, unless I was first
questioned. I cared for this the less because I knew that as soon as
we were upstairs together my cousin would unburden himself to me
freely. And already I scented some mystery under his guarded speech,
which made me impatient for the time when we should be alone. I
listened with an ill grace to the chapter which my father read to the
household after supper, and i