Amelia was of opinion, when we told her this episode, that David Granton wouldn’t stop at Seldon because he was an Honourable.  Isabel was of opinion he wouldn’t stop because he had married an unpresentable young woman somewhere out in South Africa.  Charles was of opinion that, as representative of the hostile interest, he put up at the inn, because it might tie his hands in some way to be the guest of the chairman of the rival company.  And I was of opinion that he had heard of the castle, and knew it well by report as the dullest country-house to stay at in Scotland.

However that may be, young Granton insisted on remaining at the Cromarty Arms, though he told us his wife would be delighted to receive a call from Lady Vandrift and Mrs. Wentworth.  So we all returned with him to bring the Honourable Mrs. Granton up to tea at the Castle.

She was a nice little thing, very shy and timid, but by no means unpresentable, and an evident lady.  She giggled at the end of every sentence; and she was endowed with a slight squint, which somehow seemed to point all her feeble sallies.  She knew little outside South Africa; but of that she talked prettily; and she won all our hearts, in spite of the cast in her eye, by her unaffected simplicity.

Next morning Charles and I had a regular debate with young Granton about the rival options.  Our talk was of cyanide processes, reverberatories, pennyweights, water-jackets.  But it dawned upon us soon that, in spite of his red hair and his innocent manners, our friend, the Honourable David Granton, knew a thing or two.  Gradually and gracefully he let us see that Lord Craig-Ellachie had sent him for the benefit of the company, but that he had come for the benefit of the Honourable David Granton.

“I’m a younger son, Sir Charles,” he said; “and therefore I have to feather my nest for myself.  I know the ground.  My father will be guided implicitly by what I advise in the matter.  We are men of the world.  Now, let’s be business-like. You want to amalgamate.  You wouldn’t do that, of course, if you didn’t know of something to the advantage of my father’s company—­say, a lode on our land—­which you hope to secure for yourself by amalgamation.  Very well; I can make or mar your project.  If you choose to render it worth my while, I’ll induce my father and his directors to amalgamate.  If you don’t, I won’t.  That’s the long and the short of it!”

Charles looked at him admiringly.

“Young man,” he said, “you’re deep, very deep—­for your age.  Is this candour—­or deception?  Do you mean what you say?  Or do you know some reason why it suits your father’s book to amalgamate as well as it suits mine?  And are you trying to keep it from me?” He fingered his chin.  “If I only knew that,” he went on, “I should know how to deal with you.”

Young Granton smiled again.  “You’re a financier, Sir Charles,” he answered.  “I wonder, at your time of life, you should pause to ask another financier whether he’s trying to fill his own pocket—­or his father’s.  Whatever is my father’s goes to his eldest son—­and I am his youngest.”