“Fetch him his shoes!”

“That’s what FitzHoward had to do, and he didn’t like it.”

“Isn’t Mr FitzHoward nephew to the Duchess of St Bungay?”

“Nephew, or cousin, or something.”

“Dear me!” said Lady Julia, “what a horrible man!” And in this way John Eames and her ladyship became very intimate.

There was no one at dinner at the Manor that day but the earl and his sister and their single guest.  The earl when he came in was very warm in his welcome, slapping his young friend on the back, and poking jokes at him with a good-humoured if not brilliant pleasantry.

“Thrashed anybody lately, John?”

“Nobody to speak of,” said Johnny.

“Brought your nightcap down for your out-o’-doors nap?”

“No, but I’ve got a grand stick for the bull,” said Johnny.

“Ah! that’s no joke now, I can tell you,” said the earl.  “We had to sell him, and it half broke my heart.  We don’t know what had come to him, but he became quite unruly after that;—­knocked Darvel down in the straw-yard!  It was a very bad business,—­a very bad business, indeed!  Come, go and dress.  Do you remember how you came down to dinner that day?  I shall never forget how Crofts stared at you.  Come, you’ve only got twenty minutes, and you London fellows always want an hour.”

“He’s entitled to some consideration now he’s a private secretary,” said Lady Julia.

“Bless us all! yes; I forgot that.  Come, Mr Private Secretary, don’t stand on the grandeur of your neck-tie to-day, as there’s nobody here but ourselves.  You shall have an opportunity to-morrow.”

Then Johnny was handed over to the groom of the chambers, and exactly in twenty minutes he reappeared in the drawing-room.

As soon as Lady Julia had left them after dinner, the earl began to explain his plan for the coming campaign.  “I’ll tell you now what I have arranged,” said he.  “The squire is to be here to-morrow with his eldest niece,—­your Miss Lily’s sister, you know.”

“What, Bell?”

“Yes, with Bell, if her name is Bell.  She’s a very pretty girl, too.  I don’t know whether she’s not the prettiest of the two, after all.”

“That’s a matter of opinion.”

“Just so, Johnny; and do you stick to your own.  They’re coming here for three or four days.  Lady Julia did ask Mrs Dale and Lily.  I wonder whether you’ll let me call her Lily?”

“Oh, dear!  I wish I might have the power of letting you.”

“That’s just the battle that you’ve got to fight.  But the mother and the younger sister wouldn’t come.  Lady Julia says it’s all right;—­that, as a matter of course, she wouldn’t come when she heard you were to be here.  I don’t quite understand it.  In my days the young girls were ready enough to go where they knew they’d meet their lovers, and I never thought any the worse of them for it.”

“It wasn’t because of that,” said Eames.