‘Upon my word that was very good-natured of you,’ said Mrs Thorne.

’I never keep a fellow to his desk who has really go important business elsewhere,’ said Sir Raffle.  ’The country, I say, can afford to do as much as that for her servants.  But then I like to know that the business is business.  One doesn’t choose to be humbugged.’

‘I daresay you are humbugged, as you call it, very often,’ said Harold Smith.

’Perhaps so; perhaps I am; perhaps that is the opinion which they have of me at the Treasury.  But you were hardly long enough there, Smith, to have learned much about it, I should say.’

’I don’t suppose I should have known much about it, as you call it, if I had stayed till Doomsday.’

’I daresay not; I daresay not.  Men who begin as late as you did never know what official life really means.  Now I’ve been at it all my life, and I think I do understand it.’

’It’s not a profession I should like unless where it’s joined with politics,’ said Harold Smith.

‘But then it’s apt to be so short,’ said Sir Raffle Buffle.  Now it had once happened in the life of Mr Harold Smith that he had been in a Ministry, but, unfortunately, that Ministry had gone out almost within a week of the time of Mr Smith’s adhesion.  Sir Raffle and Mr Smith had known each other for many years, and were accustomed to make civil little speeches to each other in society.

’I’d sooner be a horse in a mill than have to go to an office every day,’ said Mrs Smith, coming to her husband’s assistance.  ’You, Sir Raffle, have kept yourself fresh and pleasant through it all; but who besides you ever did?’

‘I hope I am fresh,’ said Sir Raffle; ’and as for pleasantness, I will leave that for you to determine.’

‘There can be but one opinion,’ said Mrs Thorne.

The conversation had strayed away from John Eames, and Lily was disappointed.  It was a pleasure to her when people talked of him in her hearing, and as a question or two had been asked about him, making him the hero of the moment, it seemed to her that he was being robbed of his due when the little amenities between Mr and Mrs Harold Smith and Sir Raffle Buffle banished his name from the circle.  Nothing more, however, was said of him at dinner, and I fear that he would have been altogether forgotten throughout the evening, had not Lily Dale referred—­not to him, which she could not possibly have been induced to do—­but to the subject of his journey.  ’I wonder whether poor Mr Crawley will be found guilty?’ She said to Sir Raffle upon in the drawing-room.

‘I am afraid he will; I am afraid he will,’ said Sir Raffle; ’and I fear, my dear Miss Dale, that I must go further than that.  I fear I must express an opinion that he is guilty.’

‘Nothing will ever make me think so,’ said Lily.

‘Ladies are always tender-hearted,’ said Sir Raffle, ’and especially young ladies—­and pretty young ladies.  I do not wonder that such should be your opinion.  But you see, Miss Dale, a man of business has to look at these things in a business light.  What I want to know is, where did he get that cheque?  He is bound to be explicit in answering that before anybody can acquit him.’