“Byron!” Aubrey ejaculated, with one of his impatient shrugs. “I don’t know how you can read such stuff!”

“Of course you don’t, love—and I must own I wish Oswald had found himself unable to do so. I wonder what excuse Edward will offer us for this visit? Surely there cannot have been another Royal marriage, or General Election?”

“Or that he should think we care for such trash.” Aubrey turned away from the window. “Are you going to marry him?” he asked.

“No—oh, I don’t know! I am sure he would be a kind husband, but try as I will I can’t hold him in anything but esteem,” she replied, in a comically despairing tone.

“Why do you try?”

“Well, I must marry someone, you know! Conway will certainly do so, and then what is to become of me? It wouldn’t suit me to continue living here, dwindling into an aunt—and I daresay it wouldn’t suit my unknown sister either!”

“Oh, you may live with me! I shan’t be married, and I shouldn’t at all object to it: you never trouble me!”

Her eyes danced, but she assured him gravely that she was very much obliged to him.

“You would like it better than to be married to Edward.”

“Poor Edward! Do you dislike him so much?”

He replied, with a twisted smile: “I never forget, when he’s with us, that I’m a cripple, m’dear.”

A voice was heard to say, beyond the door: “In the breakfast-parlour, are they? Oh, you need not announced me: I know my way!”

Aubrey added: “And I dislike his knowing his way!”

“So do I, indeed! There is no escape!” she agreed, turning to greet the visitors.

Two gentlemen of marked dissimilarity came into the room, the elder, a solid-looking man in his thirtieth year, leading the way, as one who did not doubt his welcome; the younger, a youth of nineteen, with a want of assurance imperfectly concealed by a slight, nonchalant swagger.