‘An objectionable party, rather, I should say,’ said Eames.

’Well, yes; Musselbro is objectionable.  He’s very good-humoured you know, and good-looking in a sort of way, and goes everywhere; that is among people of this sort.  Of course he’s not hand-and-glove with Lord Derby; and I wish he could be made to wash his hands.  They haven’t any other standing dish, and you may meet anybody.  They always have a Member of Parliament; they generally manage to catch a Baronet; and I have met a Peer there.  On that august occasion Musselbro was absent.’

So instructed, Eames, on entering that room, looked round at once for Mr Musselbro.  ‘If I don’t see the whiskers and chain,’ he had said, I shall know there’s a Peer.’  Mr Musselbro was in the room, but Eames had descried Mr Crosbie long before he had seen Mr Musselbro.

There was no reason for confusion on his part in meeting Crosbie.  They had both loved Lily Dale.  Crosbie might have been successful, but for his own fault.  Eames had on one occasion been thrown into contact with him, and on that occasion had quarrelled with him and had beaten him, giving him a black eye, and in this way obtained some mastery over him.  There was no reason why he should be ashamed of meeting Crosbie; and yet, when he saw him, the blood mounted all over his face, and he forgot to make any further search for Mr Musselbro.

‘I am so much obliged to Mr Dalrymple for bringing you,’ said Mrs Dobbs Broughton very sweetly, ’only he ought to have come sooner.  Naughty man!  I know it was his fault.  Will you take Miss Demolines down?  Miss Demolines—­Mr Eames.’

Mr Dobbs Broughton was somewhat sulky and had not welcomed our hero very cordially.  He was beginning to think that Conway gave himself airs and did not sufficiently understand that a man who had horses at Market Harboro’ and ’41 Lafitte was at any rate as good as a painter who was pelted with gilt sugar-plums for painting countesses.  But he was a man whose ill-humour never lasted long, and he was soon pressing his wine on Johnny Eames as though he loved him dearly.

But there was a few minutes before they went down to dinner, and Johnny Eames, as he endeavoured to find something to say to Miss Demolines—­which was difficult, as he did not in the least know Miss Demolines’ line of conversation—­was aware that his efforts were impeded by thoughts of Mr Crosbie.  The man looked older than when he had last seen him—­so much older that Eames was astonished.  He was bald, or becoming bald; and his whiskers were grey, or were becoming grey, and he was much fatter.  Johnny Eames, who was always thinking of Lily Dale, could not now keep himself from thinking of Adolphus Crosbie.  He saw at a glance that the man was in mourning, though there was nothing but his shirt-studs by which to tell it; and he knew that he was in mourning for his wife.  ‘I wish she might have lived for ever,’ Johnny said to himself.