oung nobleman which came tramping, or
rather stamping, through the long passage, and up the two or three steps
at the end of it. Neither was it Lord Etherington's graceful figure
which was seen when the door opened, but the stout square substance of
Mr. Peregrine Touchwood.

CHAPTER XVII.

A RELATIVE.

Claim'd kindred there, and had his claims allow'd.

_Deserted Village._

Starting at the unexpected and undesired apparition which presented
itself, in the manner described at the end of the last chapter, Mowbray
yet felt, at the same time, a kind of relief, that his meeting with Lord
Etherington, painfully decisive as that meeting must be, was for a time
suspended. So it was with a mixture of peevishness and internal
satisfaction, that he demanded what had procured him the honour of a
visit from Mr. Touchwood at this late hour.

"Necessity, that makes the old wife trot," replied Touchwood; "no choice
of mine, I assure you--Gad, Mr. Mowbray, I would rather have crossed
Saint Gothard, than run the risk I have done to-night, rumbling through
your breakneck roads in that d----d old wheelbarrow.--On my word, I
believe I must be troublesome to your butler for a draught of
something--I am as thirsty as a coal-heaver that is working by the
piece. You have porter, I suppose, or good old Scotch two-penny?"

With a secret execration on his visitor's effrontery, Mr. Mowbray
ordered the servant to put down wine and water, of which Touchwood
mixed a gobletful, and drank it off.

"We are a small family," said his entertainer; "and I am seldom at
home--still more seldom receive guests, when I chance to be here--I am
sorry I have no malt liquor, if you prefer it."

"Prefer it?" said Touchwood, compounding, however, another glass of
sherry and water, and adding a large piece of sugar, to correct the
hoarseness which, he observed, his night journey might bring on,--"to be
sure I prefer it, and so does every body, except Frenchmen and
dandies.--No offence, Mr. Mowbray, but you should order a hogshead from
Meux--the brown-stout, wired down for exportation to the colonies, keeps
for any length of time, and in every climate--I have drank it where it
must have cost a guinea a quart, if interest had been counted."

"When I _expect_ the honour of a visit from you, Mr. Touchwood, I will
endeavour to be better provided," answered Mowbray; "at present your
arrival has been without notice, and I would be glad to know if it has