‘A day or two,’ was the reply.  ’We’ll drive over to Pooley Bridge for his bag this afternoon; he left it at the hotel.’

‘What has he on his mind?’ she continued, smiling.

’Some idealistic project.  He has only given me a hint.  I dare say we shall hear all about it to-night.’

CHAPTER II

THE IDEALIST

When Egremont began his acquaintance with the Newthorpes he was an Oxford undergraduate.  A close friendship had sprung up between him and a young man named Ormonde, and at the latter’s home he met Mr. Newthorpe, who, from the first, regarded him with interest.  A year after Mrs. Newthorpe’s death Egremont was invited to visit the house at Ullswater; since then he had twice spent a week there.  This personal intercourse was slight to have resulted in so much intimacy, but he had kept up a frequent correspondence with Mr. Newthorpe from various parts of the world, and common friends aided the stability of the relation.

He was the only son of a man who had made a fortune by the manufacture of oil-cloth.  His father began life as a house-painter, then became an oil merchant in a small way, and at length married a tradesman’s daughter, who brought him a moderate capital just when he needed it for an enterprise promising greatly.  In a short time he had established the firm of Egremont & Pollard, with extensive works in Lambeth.  His wife died before him; his son received a liberal education, and in early manhood found himself, as far as he knew, without a living relative, but with ample means of independence.  Young Walter Egremont retained an interest in the business, but had no intention of devoting himself to a commercial life.  At the University he had made alliances with men of standing, in the academical sense, and likewise with some whose place in the world relieved them from the necessity of establishing a claim to intellect.  In this way society was opened to him, and his personal qualities won for him a great measure of regard from those whom he most desired to please.

Somebody had called him ‘the Idealist,’ and the name adhered to him.  At two-and-twenty he published a volume of poems, obviously derived from study of Shelley, but marked with a certain freshness of impersonal aspiration which was pleasant enough.  They had the note of sincerity rather than the true poetical promise.  The book had no successor.  Having found this utterance for his fervour, Egremont began a series of ramblings over sea, in search, he said, of himself.  The object seemed to evade him; he returned to England from time to time, always in appearance more restless, but always overflowing with ideas, for which he had the readiest store of enthusiastic words.  He was able to talk of himself without conveying the least impression of egotism to those who were in sympathy with his intellectual point of view; he was accused of conceit only by a