So, when the Reverend Laurence had ventured to suggest to the present Marquis that Charles was a suitable candidate for the post of secretary, Alverstoke had accepted him with far more readiness than Charles had felt in becoming a member of his household. Charles had no desire to enter the Church, but he was a young man of serious mind and unimpeachable morals, and nothing he had heard of Alverstoke led him to expect that his appointment would prove to be anything but a mortification of the flesh. But as he had, besides commonsense, a good deal of filial affection, and knew that to a clergyman of moderate substance it was no easy task to provide for a sixth son, he kept his misgivings to himself, assured his father that he would do his best not to disappoint his expectations, and derived what consolation he could from the reflection that when he was an inmate of Alverstoke House he must surely find it easier to discover and to grasp a golden opportunity than while he kicked his heels in a country parsonage.

Since his taste ran to politics, the golden opportunity had not so far offered itself, the Marquis not sharing his ambition, and consequently making infrequent appearances in the Upper House; but he was allowed to write such brief speeches as his patron felt that it behooved him to utter, and even, now and then, to favour him with his own political convictions.

Furthermore, he had found it quite impossible to dislike Alverstoke. While he was given no reason to suppose that Alverstoke was interested in his concerns, he found him to be as unexacting as he was amiable, and never disagreeably high in the instep. Comparing notes with a college-friend, in a similar situation, whose employer appeared to regard him as a cross between a black slave and an upper servant, Charles knew himself to be fortunate. Alverstoke could give an annihilating snub to some encroaching mushroom, but if his secretary erred he raked him down in a manner which was unexceptionable, since it conveyed no suggestion of social superiority.