himself
would stay at an inn at Brotherton. Anything, even the deanery, would
be better than sitting at table with his brother, with the insults of
their last interview unappeased. At the end of five minutes he plucked
up his courage, and asked his brother another question. "Are you going
to the house, Brotherton?"

"The house! What house? I'm going to a house, I hope."

"I mean to Manor Cross."

"Not if I know it. There is no house in this part of the country in
which I should be less likely to show my face." Then there was not
another word said till they reached the Brotherton Station, and there
the Marquis, who was sitting next the door, requested his brother to
leave the carriage first. "Get out, will you?" he said. "I must wait
for somebody to come and take these things. And don't trample on me
more than you can help." This last request had apparently been made,
because Lord George was unable to step across him without treading on
the cloak.

"I will say good-bye, then," said Lord George, turning round on the
platform for a moment.

"Ta, ta," said the Marquis, as he gave his attention to the servant who
was collecting the fruit, and the flowers, and the flask. Lord George
then passed on out of the station, and saw no more of his brother.

"Of course he is going to Rudham," said Lady Susanna, when she heard
the story. Rudham Park was the seat of Mr. De Baron, Mrs. Houghton's
father, and tidings had reached Manor Cross long since that the Marquis
had promised to go there in the autumn. No doubt other circumstances
had seemed to make it improbable that the promise should be kept.
Popenjoy had gone away ill,--as many said, in a dying condition. Then
the Marquis had been thrown into a fireplace, and report had said that
his back had been all but broken. It had certainly been generally
thought that the Marquis would go nowhere after that affair in the
fireplace, till he returned to Italy. But Lady Susanna was, in truth,
right. His Lordship was on his way to Rudham Park.

Mr. De Baron, of Rudham Park, though a much older man than the Marquis,
had been the Marquis's friend,--when the Marquis came of age, being
then the Popenjoy of those days and a fast young man known as such
about England. Mr. De Baron, who was a neighbour, had taken him by the
hand. Mr. De Baron had put him in the way of buying and training
race-horses, and had, perhaps, been godfather to his pleasures in other
matters. Rudham Park had never be