This time Mrs. Errington turned her head, so as to look full at her interlocutor. There met her view the same calm forehead, the same steady eyes, the same sheltering hand gently stroking the upper lip, which she had looked upon a minute before. "My good sir!" she answered, in a tone of patient explanation, "my own family, the Ancrams, were people of the very first quality in Warwickshire. My grandfather never stirred out without his coach and four!" "Ah!" "Oh, yes, Algy's prospects in life ought to be very, very different from what they are. Of course he ought to go to the university; but I cannot afford to send him there. I make no secret of my circumstances. College is out of the question for him, poor boy, unless he entered himself as a what-do-you-call-it? A sort of pauper, a sizar. And I suppose you would hardly advise him to do that!" "No; I should by no means advise it. I was a sizar myself." "Really? Ah well, then you know what it is. And I am quite sure it would never suit Algy's spirits." "I am quite sure it would not." Mrs. Errington's good opinion of the tutor's judgment, which had been considerably shaken, began to revive. "I see you know something of his character," said she, smiling. "Well, then, the case stands thus; Algy is turned eighteen; he has had the best education I could give him--indeed, my chief motive for settling in this obscure little hole, when I was left a widow, was the fact that Dr. Bodkin, who was an old acquaintance of my husband, was head of the Grammar School here, and I knew I could give my boy the education of a gentleman--up to a certain point--at small expense. He has had this offer from the Bristol man, and he has had another offer of a very different sort from my side of the house." "Indeed!" "Oh, yes; perhaps if I had began by stating that circumstance, you might have modified your advice, eh, Mr. Diamond?" This was said in a tone of mild raillery. "Why," answered Mr. Diamond, slowly, "I must own that my advice usually does depend somewhat on my knowledge of the circumstances of the case under consideration." "Now, that's candid--and I love candour, as I told you. The fact is, Lord Seely married an Ancram." There was a pause. Mrs. Errington looked inquiringly at her companion. "You have heard of Lord Seely?" she said. "I have seen his name in the newspapers, in the days when I used to read newspapers." "He is a most distinguished nobleman." Another pause. "Well," continued Mrs. Errington, condescendingly, "I cannot expect all that to interest you, Mr. Diamond. Perhaps there may be a little family partiality, in my estimate of Lord Seely. However, be that as it may, he married an Ancram. She was of the younger branch, my father's second cousin. When Algy first began to turn his thoughts towards a diplomatic career----" "Eh?" "A diplomatic----Oh, didn't you know? Yes; he has had serious thoughts of it for some time." "Algernon?"