"Well?" said the baronet.

"He complains of being hungry," the butler hesitated, with a look of
solemn disgust.

"Let him eat."

Heavy Benson hesitated still more as he announced that the boy had called
for wine. It was an unprecedented thing. Sir Austin's brows were
portending an arch, but Adrian suggested that he wanted possibly to drink
his birthday, and claret was conceded.

The boys were in the vortex of a partridge-pie when Adrian strolled in to
them. They had now changed characters. Richard was uproarious. He
drank a health with every glass; his cheeks were flushed and his eyes
brilliant. Ripton looked very much like a rogue on the tremble of
detection, but his honest hunger and the partridge-pie shielded him
awhile from Adrian's scrutinizing glance. Adrian saw there was matter
for study, if it were only on Master Ripton's betraying nose, and sat
down to hear and mark.

"Good sport, gentlemen, I trust to hear?" he began his quiet banter, and
provoked a loud peal of laughter from Richard.

"Ha, ha! I say, Rip: 'Havin' good sport, gentlemen, are ye?' You
remember the farmer! Your health, parson! We haven't had our sport yet.
We're going to have some first-rate sport. Oh, well! we haven't much
show of birds. We shot for pleasure, and returned them to the
proprietors. You're fond of game, parson! Ripton is a dead shot in what