’So is the face in the large portrait—­very singular—­more, I think, than that—­handsomer too.  This is a sickly child, I think; but the full-length is so manly, though so slender, and so handsome too.  I always think him a hero and a mystery, and they won’t tell me about him, and I can only dream and wonder.’

’He has made more people than you dream and wonder, my dear Maud.  I don’t know what to make of him.  He is a sort of idol, you know, of your father’s, and yet I don’t think he helps him much.  His abilities were singular; so has been his misfortune; for the rest, my dear, he is neither a hero nor a wonder.  So far as I know, there are very few sublime men going about the world.’

’You really must tell me all you know about him, Cousin Monica.  Now don’t refuse.’

’But why should you care to hear?  There is really nothing pleasant to tell.’

’That is just the reason I wish it.  If it were at all pleasant, it would be quite commonplace.  I like to hear of adventures, dangers, and misfortunes; and above all, I love a mystery.  You know, papa will never tell me, and I dare not ask him; not that he is ever unkind, but, somehow, I am afraid; and neither Mrs. Rusk nor Mary Quince will tell me anything, although I suspect they know a good deal.’

’I don’t see any good in telling you, dear, nor, to say the truth, any great harm either.’

’No—­now that’s quite true—­no harm.  There can’t be, for I must know it all some day, you know, and better now, and from you, than perhaps from a stranger, and in a less favourable way.’

’Upon my word, it is a wise little woman; and really, that’s not such bad sense after all.’

So we poured out another cup of tea each, and sipped it very comfortably by the fire, while Lady Knollys talked on, and her animated face helped the strange story.

‘It is not very much, after all.  Your uncle Silas, you know, is living?’

‘Oh yes, in Derbyshire.’

’So I see you do know something of him, sly girl! but no matter.  You know how very rich your father is; but Silas was the younger brother, and had little more than a thousand a year.  If he had not played, and did not care to marry, it would have been quite enough—­ever so much more than younger sons of dukes often have; but he was—­well, a mauvais sujet—­you know what that is.  I don’t want to say any ill of him—­more than I really know—­but he was fond of his pleasures, I suppose, like other young men, and he played, and was always losing, and your father for a long time paid great sums for him.  I believe he was really a most expensive and vicious young man; and I fancy he does not deny that now, for they say he would change the past if he could.

I was looking at the pensive little boy in the oval frame—­aged eight years—­who was, a few springs later, ’a most expensive and vicious young man,’ and was now a suffering and outcast old one, and wondering from what a small seed the hemlock or the wallflower grows, and how microscopic are the beginnings of the kingdom of God or of the mystery of iniquity in a human being’s heart.