hers, and looking tenderly but painfully into his face. She so sat
with him for above an hour, but he spoke to her no word of this
revelation he was about to make. Herbert and the girls, and even
Aunt Letty, sat solemn and silent, as though it was known by them
all that something dreadful was to be said and done. At last
Herbert, who had left the room, returned to it. "My father will see
you now, Mr. Prendergast, if you will step up to him," said he; and
then he ran to his mother and told her that he should leave the
house till dinner-time.

"But if he sends for you, Herbert, should you not be in the way?"

"It is more likely that he should send for you; and, were I to
remain here, I should be going into his room when he did not want
me." And then he mounted his horse and rode off.

Mr. Prendergast, with serious air and slow steps, and solemn resolve
to do what he had to do at any rate with justice, walked away from
the dining-room to the baronet's study. The task of an old friend is
not always a pleasant one, and Mr. Prendergast felt that it was not
so at the present moment. "Be gentle with him," said Aunt Letty,
catching hold of his arm as he went through the passage. He merely
moved his head twice, in token of assent, and then passed on into
the room.

The reader will have learnt by this time, with tolerable accuracy,
what was the nature of the revelation which Sir Thomas was called
upon to make, and he will be tolerably certain as to the advice
which Mr. Prendergast, as an honest man, would give. In that respect
there was no difficulty. The laws of meum and tuum are sufficiently