e spur of the moment.

"He is so angry about it all!"

After that Miss Baker was not allowed back to Littlebath, even to
pack up or pay her bills, or say good-bye to those she left behind.
The servant had to do it all. Reflecting on the danger which had been
surmounted, Mr. Bertram determined that she should not again be put
in the way of temptation.

And this was the end of Sir Lionel's wooing.

CHAPTER III.

A QUIET LITTLE DINNER.

Sir Henry Harcourt was married and took his bride to Paris and Nice;
and Sir Lionel Bertram tried to get married, but his bride--bride
as he hoped her to have been--ran away by herself to Hadley. In the
meantime George Bertram lived alone in his dark dull chambers in
London.

He would fain have been all alone; but at what was perhaps the worst
moment of his misery, his father came to him. It may be remembered
how anxiously he had longed to know his father when he first
commenced that journey to Jerusalem, how soon he became attached to
him, how fascinated he had been by Sir Lionel's manners, how easily
he forgave the first little traits of un-paternal conduct on his
father's part, how gradually the truth forced itself upon his mind.
But now, at this time, the truth had forced itself on his mind. He
knew his father for what he was.

And his mind was not one which could reject such knowledge, or alter
the nature of it because the man was his father. There are those
to whom a father's sins, or a husband's sins, or a brother's sins
are no sins at all. And of such one may say, that though we must of
compulsion find their judgment to be in some sort delinquent, that
their hearts more than make up for such delinquency. One knows that
they are wrong, but can hardly wish them to be less so.

But George Bertram was not one of them: he had been in no hurry to
condemn his father; but, having seen his sins, he knew them for sins,
and did condemn them. He found that his uncle had been right, and
that Sir Lionel was a man whom he could in no wise respect, and could
hardly love. Money he perceived was his father's desire. He would
therefore give him what money he could spare; but he would not give
him his society.

When, therefore, Sir Lionel announced his arrival in town and his
intention to remain there some little time, George Bertram was by no
means solaced in his misery. In those days he was very miserable. It
was only now that he knew how thoroughly he loved this woman--now
tha