see that she had, in truth, been unable to resist what the steward termed
his "pleasant ways."

As if to escape from a scolding, she talked volubly all the time, bustling
nervously through the rooms, along which I followed her guidance with a
hushed footstep. The principal apartments were on the ground-floor, or
rather, a floor raised some ten or fifteen feet above the ground; they had
not been modernized since the date in which they were built. Hangings of
faded silk; tables of rare marble, and mouldered gilding; comfortless
chairs at drill against the walls; pictures, of which connoisseurs alone
could estimate the value, darkened by dust or blistered by sun and damp,
made a general character of discomfort. On not one room, on not one
nook, still lingered some old smile of home.

Meanwhile, I gathered from the housekeeper's rambling answers to questions
put to her by the steward, as I moved on, glancing at the pictures, that
Margrave's visit that day was not his first. He had been to the house
twice before,--his ostensible excuse that he was an amateur in pictures
(though, as I had before observed, for that department of art he had no
taste); but each time he had talked much of Sir Philip. He said that
though not personally known to him, he had resided in the same towns
abroad, and had friends equally intimate with Sir Philip; but when the
steward inquired if the visitor had given any information as to the
absentee, it became very clear that Margrave had been rather asking
questions than volunteering intelligence.

We had now come to the end of the state apartments, the last of which was
a library. "And," said the old woman, "I don't wonder the gentleman knew
Sir Philip, for he seemed a scholar, and looked very hard over the books,
especially those old ones by the fireplace, which Sir Philip, Heaven bless