d friend, Major Pendennis?" asked Mr. Wagg.

"His nephew. Had the pleasure of meeting you at Gaunt House," Mr. Pen
said with his very best air--the acquaintance between the gentlemen was
made in an instant.

In the afternoon of the next day, the two gentlemen who were staying
at Clavering Park were found by Mr. Pen on his return from a fishing
excursion, in which he had no sport, seated in his mother's drawing-room
in comfortable conversation with the widow and her ward. Mr. Pynsent,
tall and gaunt, with large red whiskers and an imposing tuft to his
chin, was striding over a chair in the intimate neighbourhood of Miss
Laura. She was amused by his talk, which was simple, straightforward,
rather humorous and keen, and interspersed with homely expressions of
a style which is sometimes called slang. It was the first specimen of a
young London dandy that Laura had seen or heard: for she had been but a
chit at the time of Mr. Foker's introduction at Fairoaks, nor indeed was
that ingenuous gentleman much more than a boy, and his refinement was
only that of a school and college.

Mr. Wagg, as he entered the Fairoaks premises with his companion, eyed
and noted everything. "Old gardener," he said, seeing Mr. John at the
lodge--"old red livery waistcoat--clothes hanging out to dry on the
gooseberry-bushes--blue aprons, white ducks--gad, they must be young
Pendennis's white ducks--nobody else wears 'em in the family. Rather a
shy place for a sucking county member, ay, Pynsent?"

"Snug little crib," said Mr. Pynsent, "pretty cosy little lawn."

"Mr. Pendennis at home, old gentleman?" Mr. Wagg said to the old
domestic. John answered, "No, Master Pendennis was agone out."

"Are the ladies at home?" asked the younger visitor. Mr. John answered,
"Yes, they be;" and as the pair walked over the trim gravel, and by the
neat shrubberies, up the steps to the hall-door, which old John opened,
Mr. Wagg noted everything that he saw; the barometer and the letter-bag,
the umbrellas and the ladies' clogs, Pen's hats and tartan wrapper, and
old John opening the drawing-room door, to introduce the new-comers.
Such minutiae attracted Wagg instinctively; he seized them in spite of
himself.

"Old fellow does all the work," he whispered to Pynsent. "Caleb
Balderstone. Shouldn't wonder if he's the housemaid." The next minute
the pair were in the presence of the Fairoaks ladies; in whom Pynsent
could not help recognising two perfectly well-bred la