to interfere in her failures.  And what was he to say to this young lord?  Being fat and old and plethoric he could not be expected to use a stick and thrash the young lord.  Pistols were gone,—­a remembrance of which fact perhaps afforded some consolation.  Nobody now need be afraid of anybody, and the young lord would not be afraid of him.  Arabella declared that there had been an engagement.  The young lord would of course declare that there had been none.  Upon the whole he was inclined to believe it most probable that his daughter was lying.  He did not think it likely that Lord Rufford should have been such a fool.  As for taking Lord Rufford by the back of his neck and shaking him into matrimony, he knew that that would be altogether out of his power.  And then the hour was so wretchedly early.  It was that little fool Mistletoe who had named ten o’clock,—­a fellow who took Parliamentary papers to bed with him, and had a blue book brought to him every morning at half-past seven with a cup of tea.  By ten o’clock Lord Augustus would not have had time to take his first glass of soda and brandy preparatory to the labour of getting into his clothes.  But he was afraid of his wife and daughter, and absolutely did get into a cab at the door of his lodgings in Duke Street, St. James’, precisely at a quarter past ten.  As the Duke’s house was close to the corner of Clarges Street the journey he had to make was not long.

Lord Rufford would not have agreed to the interview but that it was forced upon him by his brother-in-law.  “What good can it do?” Lord Rufford had asked.  But his brother-in-law had held that that was a question to be answered by the other side.  In such a position Sir George thought that he was bound to concede as much as this,—­in fact to concede almost anything short of marriage.  “He can’t do the girl any good by talking,” Lord Rufford had said.  Sir George assented to this, but nevertheless thought that any friend deputed by her should be allowed to talk, at any rate once.  “I don’t know what he’ll say.  Do you think he’ll bring a big stick?” Sir George who knew Lord Augustus did not imagine that a stick would be brought.  “I couldn’t hit him, you know.  He’s so fat that a blow would kill him.”  Lord Rufford wanted his brother-in-law to go with him; but Sir George assured him that this was impossible.  It was a great bore.  He had to go up to London all alone,—­in February, when the weather was quite open and hunting was nearly coming to an end.  And for what?  Was it likely that such a man as Lord Augustus should succeed in talking him into marrying any girl?  Nevertheless he went, prepared to be very civil, full of sorrow at the misunderstanding, but strong in his determination not to yield an inch.  He arrived at the mansion precisely at ten o’clock and was at once shown into a back room on the ground floor.  He saw no one but a very demure old servant who seemed to look upon him as one who was sinning against the