Fanny stepped softly forward and kissed him, in a shy, perfunctory manner; and then good-natured Tom shook his hand, and Philip followed suit; after which Mrs. Faringfield embraced him somewhat stiffly, and I gingerly held his fingers a moment, and my mother hoped he found himself well.

“Quite well, I thank you, considering,” said he; and then gazed in a half-scared way at his father.  All the old defiance had disappeared under the blows of adversity.

“Well, sir,” said his father, coldly, “we had scarce looked for you back among us.”

“No, sir,” said Ned, still standing.  “I had no right to be looked for, sir—­no more than the prodigal son had.  I’m a bit like him, sir.”

“Don’t count upon the fatted calf, however.”

“No, sir; not me.  Very plain fare will do for me.  I—­I ask your pardon, sir, for that—­that business about Mr. Palmer.”

“The world has put you into a humble mood,” said Mr. Faringfield, with sarcastic indifference.

“Yes, sir; the way of transgressors is hard, sir.”

“Why don’t you sit down?” put in Mrs. Faringfield, who was made uncomfortable by the sight of others being so.

“Thank you, mother,” said Ned, availing himself of the implied permission.

“I hear you’ve undergone a reformation,” said his father.

“I hope so, sir.  They tell me I’ve got religion.”

“Who tells you?”

“The Methodists.  I went to their meetings in London.  I—­I thought I needed a little of that kind of thing.  That’s how I happened to—­to save my soul.”

“And how do you conceive you will provide for your body?”

“I don’t know yet—­exactly.  If I might stay here till I could find some employment—­”

Mr. Faringfield met the pleading look of Fanny, and the prudent one of his wife.  The latter reflected, as plainly as words, what had manifestly entered his own mind:  that immunity from future trouble on Ned’s account might indeed be had without recourse to a step entailing public disgrace upon the family.  So he said: 

“My intention was, if you should ever show your face in New York again, to see you punished for that matter of the money and Mr. Palmer.  I don’t give up that intention; I shall only postpone carrying it out, during your good behaviour.”

“Thank you, sir; I dare say it’s better than I deserve.”

And so was Mr. Ned established home again, to be provided for by his father until he should obtain some means of self-support.  In this task his father offered no assistance, being cautious against vouching for a person hitherto so untrustworthy; and it soon became evident that Ned was not very vigorously prosecuting the task himself.  He had the excuse that it was a bad time for the purpose, the country being so unsettled in the expectation of continued war.  And he was content to remain an idle charge upon his father’s bounty, a somewhat neglected inmate of the house,