left-hand neighbour. There remained Bertha Afflint, whom he had
hitherto admired with fear. To talk with her was exhausting to frail
mortality, and he had avoided the pleasure except in moments of
boisterous bodily and mental health. Now she was his one resource, and
the unfortunate man, rashly entering into a contest of wit, found
himself badly worsted by her ready tongue. He declared that she was
worse than her mother, at which the unabashed young woman replied that
the superiority of parents was the last retort of the vanquished. He
registered an inward vow that Miss Afflint should be used on the morrow
as a weapon to quell Mr. Stocks.

When Alice escaped to the drawing-room she found Bertha and her sister--a
younger and ruddier copy--busy with the letters which had arrived by the
evening post. Lady Manorwater, who reserved her correspondence for the
late hours, seized upon the girl and carried her off to sit by the great
French windows from which lawn and park sloped down to the moorland
loch. She chattered pleasantly about many things, and then innocently
and abruptly asked her if she had not found her companion at table
amusing.

Alice, unaccustomed to fiction, gave a hesitating "Yes," at which her
hostess looked pleased. "He is very clever, you know," she said, "and
has been very useful to me on many occasions."

Alice asked his occupation.

"Oh, he has done many things. He has been very brave and quite the
maker of his own fortunes. He educated himself, and then I think he
edited some Nonconformist paper. Then he went into politics, and became
a Churchman. Some old man took a liking to him and left him his money,