gether.

"And where is Kate?"

"You will see her presently. She will be here to dinner, with Agnes
and Harry. I sent her off, because I wanted to have you all to
myself, for the first hour. The others came up to town, three days
ago, on purpose to be here when you arrived. Of course, we heard
when your ship called at Plymouth. We had been looking for her, for
your last letter told us the name of the vessel that you were
coming by; so I wrote to them, and they came up at once. They
wanted us to go and dine with them, but I would not hear of it. I
was sure that you would much rather dine quietly, here, than in
state in Portman Square, with three or four footmen behind our
chairs."

"Ever so much better, mother. I suppose I shall hardly know Agnes,
but Harry cannot have altered much; besides, I have seen him four
years later than her."

Harry's greeting was of the heartiest kind. Stanley's sisters felt,
at first, a little strange with this brother of whom they had but a
faint remembrance.

"It does not seem to me, Harry, that your dignities have tamed you
down much."

"No, indeed," Harry laughed. "I find it, sometimes, very difficult
to act up to my position. I never quite feel that I am an earl,
except on the rare occasions when I go to the House of Lords--which
I only do when my vote is wanted, on an important division.

"The gloom of that place is enough to sober anyone. I can assure
you that, when I heard of the fire, I felt absolutely pleased. Of
course, they will build another one, perhaps grander than the last,
and as gloomy but, thank goodness, it must be years before it can
be finished and, until then, we shall have to put up with temporary
premises.

"Your chances of an earldom are getting more and more remote,
Stanley. There are three boys barring the way, already. I had
proposed to myself not to marry--in which case you or a son of
yours would have followed me--but your sister overpersuaded me."

Agnes tossed her head, as she said:

"At any rate, Harry, if you made that resolution, it was not worth
much, as you gave it up at the first opportunity. I was the first
girl you met, when you arrived in England; and I doubt whether you
had seen another, before we came down to stay at Netherly. I had
not been there two days before you began to make love to me."

"The temptation would excuse anything, my dear," Harry laughed.
"Besides, you see, I saw at once that it was but fair and right to
Stanley tha