one and
Lochend, the sails on the Firth with young Walter, the Doctor's son, as
his companion. For Lalor was so wise that he never asked him out alone.
So Louis had been silent, bribed by the liberty and the golden guineas,
which were as plentiful with Lalor as they were scarce with Irma and
myself. The Doctor was charmed with his visitor, the ex-governor of a
great province in the Netherlands (which he looked out in the
Encyclopaedia and lectured upon)--and as for Walter, his son, at that
date he would have bartered his soul for five hours' absence from the
paternal academy and a dozen sticks of toffee.

Then with what unwonted and flattering deference the boy's entertainer
had treated him. To him he was Sir Louis, the head of the house. He
would heir its great properties, the value and extent of which had been
hidden from him by Irma and myself. Doubtless we had our own reasons for
thus concealing the truth, but Uncle Lalor's position with the
Government enabled him to assure Sir Louis that, through his influence,
all its ancient dignities would be restored to the family.

Hence it was that, at the first sight of the slim man with the powdered
wig tied in a gay favour behind his back, Louis had run and flung
himself into his arms. Perhaps, also, it had something to do with his
disappointment in Irma, and it was in this open way that he chose to
punish her.

Yet when Lalor Maitland had come into the parlour, and I had spoken with
him, the man's frank and smiling recognition of the circumstances, his
high, easy manner, an old-world politeness as of one long familiar with
courts, yet a kindly gentleman withal, prepossessed me in his favour
even against myself.

"Well," he said, with that rare smile which distinguished him, "here we
have the fortune of war. You and I have met before, sir, and there are
few that have faced me as you did, being at the time only a boy--and not
myself only, but Dick, the boldest man on the _Golden Hind_."

He tapped a careless tattoo on the table with his fingers.

"Ah, they were good days, after all," he said; "mad days--when it was
win ten thousand or walk the plank every time the brig put her nose
outside the harbour bar!"

"It turned out the ten thousand, I presume?" I said, without too much
unbending.

"Oh," he answered lightly, "as to myself, I was never very deeply
entered. I had ever an anchor out to windward. It was rare that I acted
without orders, and, having been in a hi