e spoke a few words to him. "My last
request to you, Mr. Mason, is to beg that you will be tender to your
mother."

"I will do my best, Mrs. Orme."

"All her sufferings and your own, have come from her great love for
you."

"That I know and feel, but had her ambition for me been less it would
have been better for both of us." And there he stood bare-headed at
the door while Peregrine Orme handed his mother into the carriage.
Thus Mrs. Orme took her last leave of Orley Farm, and was parted from
the woman she had loved with so much truth and befriended with so
much loyalty.

Very few words were spoken in the carriage between Peregrine and
his mother while they were being taken back through Hamworth to The
Cleeve. To Peregrine the whole matter was unintelligible. He knew
that the verdict had been in favour of Lady Mason, and yet there
had been no signs of joy at Orley Farm, or even of contentment. He
had heard also from Lucius, while they had been together for a few
minutes, that Orley Farm was to be given up.

"You'll let it I suppose," Peregrine had asked.

"It will not be mine to let. It will belong to my brother," Lucius
had answered. Then Peregrine had asked no further question; nor had
Lucius offered any further information.

But his mother, as he knew, was worn out with the work she had done,
and at the present moment he felt that the subject was one which
would hardly bear questions. So he sat by her side in silence; and
before the carriage had reached The Cleeve his mind had turned away
from the cares and sorrows of Lady Mason, and was once more at
Noningsby. After all, as he said to himself, who could be worse off
than he was. He had nothing to hope.

They found Sir Peregrine standing in the hall to receive them, and
Mrs. Orme, though she had been absent only three days, could not but
perceive the havoc which this trial had made upon him. It was not
that the sufferings of those three days had broken him down, but that
now, after that short absence, she was able to perceive how great had
been upon him the effect of his previous sufferings. He had never
held up his head since the day on which Lady Mason had made to him
her first confession. Up to that time he had stood erect, and though
as he walked his steps had shown that he was no longer young, he
had walked with a certain air of strength and manly bearing. Till
Lady Mason had come to The Cleeve no one would have said that Sir
Peregrine looked as tho