“Dear Mr. Annesley,—­You spent a few days here on one occasion, and I want to renew the pleasure which your visit gave me.  Will you extend your kindness so far as to come to Tretton for any time you may please to name beyond two or three days?  I am sorry to say that your friend Augustus Scarborough cannot be here to meet you.  My other son, Mountjoy, may be here.  If you wish to escape him, I will endeavor so to fix the time when I shall have heard from you.  But I think there need be no ill blood there.  Neither of you did anything of which you are, probably, ashamed; though as an old man I am bound to express my disapproval.”

("Surely he must be ashamed,” said Miss Scarborough.

“Never you mind.  Believe me, you know nothing about it.”  Then he went on with his letter.)

“But it is not merely for the pleasure of your society that I ask you.  I have a word to say to you which may be important.  Yours faithfully,

“JOHN SCARBOROUGH.”

CHAPTER XXXIX.

HOW THE LETTERS WERE RECEIVED.

We must now describe the feelings of Mr. Scarborough’s correspondents as they received his letters.  When Mr. Grey begun to read that which was addressed to him he declared that on no consideration would he go down to Tretton.  But when he came to inquire within himself as to his objection he found that it lay chiefly in his great dislike to Augustus Scarborough.  For poor Mountjoy, as he called him, he entertained a feeling of deep pity,—­and pity we know, is akin to love.  And for the squire, he in his heart felt but little of that profound dislike which he was aware such conduct as the squire’s ought to have generated.  “He is the greatest rascal that I ever knew,” he said again and again, both to Dolly and to Mr. Barry.  But yet he did not regard him as an honest man regards a rascal, and was angry with himself in consequence.  He knew that there remained with him even some spark of love for Mr. Scarborough, which to himself was inexplicable.  From the moment in which he had first admitted the fact that Augustus Scarborough was the true heir-at-law, he had been most determined in taking care that that heirship should be established.  It must be known to all men that Mountjoy was not the eldest son of his father, as the law required him to be for the inheritance of the property, and that Augustus was the eldest son; but in arranging that these truths should be notorious it had come to pass that he had learned to hate Augustus with an intensity that had redounded to the advantage both of Mountjoy and their father.  It must be so.  Augustus must become Augustus Scarborough, Esquire, of Tretton,—­but the worse luck for Tretton and all connected with it.  And Mr. Grey did resolve that, when that day should come, all relation between himself and Tretton should cease.