llows in foulness--for the love of it.

"The gentlemen in your country, Leduc, are too fastidious to enjoy life
as it should be enjoyed; they are too prone to adhere to the amusements
of their class. You have here an opportunity of perceiving how deeply
they are mistaken, what relish may lie in setting one's rank on one
side, in forgetting at times that by an accident--a sheer, incredible
accident, I assure you, Leduc--one may have been born to a gentleman's
estate."

Rotherby had drawn himself up, his dark face crimsoning.

"D'ye talk at me, sir?" he demanded. "D'ye dare discuss me with your
lackey?"

"But why not, since you search me with my tipstaff! If you can perceive
a difference, you are too subtle for me, sir."

Rotherby advanced a step; then checked. He inherited mental sluggishness
from his father. "You are insolent!" he charged Caryll. "You insult me."

"Indeed! Ha! I am working miracles."

Rotherby governed his anger by an effort. "There was enough between us
without this," said he.

"There could not be too much between us--too much space, I mean."

The viscount looked at him furiously. "I shall discuss this further with
you," said he. "The present is not the time nor place. But I shall know
where to look for you."

"Leduc, I am sure, will always be pleased to see you. He, too, is
studying manners."

Rotherby ignored the insult. "We shall see, then, whether you can do
anything more than talk."

"I hope that your lordship, too, is master of other accomplishments. As
a talker, I do not find you very gifted. But perhaps Leduc will be less
exigent than I."

"Bah!" his lordship flung at him, and went out, cursing him profusely,
Gaskell following at his master's heels.

CHAPTER V. MOONSHINE

My Lord Ostermore, though puzzled, entertained no tormenting anxiety
on the score of the search to which Mr. Caryll was to be submitted. He
assured himself from that gentleman's confident, easy manner--being a
man who always drew from things the inference that was obvious--that
either he carried no such letter as my lord expected, or else he had so
disposed of it as to baffle search.

So, for the moment, he dismissed the subject from his mind. With
Hortensia he entered the parlor across the stone-flagged passage, to
which the landlady ushered them, and turned whole-heartedly to the
matter of his ward's elopement with his son.

"Hortensia," said he, when they were alone. "You have been foolish; very