way; and all through the stupidity of my own son."

Sam sat back watching his father curiously, as he paced about the place,
addressing, as it seemed to him, the walls, the windows, and at times
the pieces of furniture. He repeated the same things over and over
again as he bemoaned his ill-fortune, and the way in which his plans had
been brought to naught. Reproach after reproach was piled upon Sam, but
the father did not glance at his son, who still watched him, but with
eyes that grew fixed and dull-looking, till all at once the lids began
to fall, opened up again, fell lower, opened again, and then went right
down, and were not raised.

For Sam was utterly exhausted by his many hours' exertions, and his
father's monotonous, droning voice, as he went on bemoaning his fate,
after irritating him for a time, and making him ready to make retorts,
gradually began to have a soothing effect, making him feel drowsy; then
more drowsy, and at last, when James Brandon paused before the chair in
which the lad lay back, and gazed full in his face, saying--

"What I want to know, sir, is, how you could be such an obstinate idiot
as to persist in going your own way, after all my strong,
carefully-thought-out advice?--what I want to know, I say, is--why, he's
asleep!"

James Brandon was quite right--his son had dropped off into a deep,
dreamless sleep, and it is probable that if he had shouted in his ear
instead of speaking in a subdued, hurried voice, he would not have
succeeded in awaking him to the sense of anything he said.

CHAPTER FORTY SIX.

Uncle Richard came back late the second night after the robbery, tired
out, and glad to go to bed, so that nothing was said respecting the
events at the observatory till the next morning at breakfast.

"Hah! no place like home, Mrs Fidler," he exclaimed. "London hotels
are all very well, but I'm always glad to get back to Heatherleigh."

"It does me good to hear you say so, sir," said the housekeeper, "for
I'm always afraid, sir, that when you come back from the grand places
you've been at you'll be dissatisfied."

"No fear of that, Mrs Fidler," said Uncle Richard merrily. "Well, Tom,
my lad, I need not ask how you are; you look quite hardy."

"There, Mrs Fidler," said Tom, "you hear that?"

"Yes, my dear, I hear that," said the housekeeper, compressing her lips;
"but you can't deceive me. You know you were ill."

"I know you wanted to dose me with prune tea," cried T