Sir Richard Wynyard, aged fifty-six, was a little, grey, square-shouldered man, with a good heart and bad temper. His father, the notorious Sir Fulke, had put his two sons into the army, given them small and irregularly paid allowances, and then abandoned them to their own devices, whilst he squandered the family patrimony on horses and cards. When Richard, his heir, was quartered in Dublin, he fell desperately in love with a beautiful Irish girl; but, painfully aware of his own empty purse, he was too prudent to marry--unlike his reckless younger brother, who adventured a runaway match on a captain’s pay and debts. Major Wynyard made no sign, much as this silence cost him, and when, after his father’s death, he had at last a roof to offer--Wynyard, a stately old place, although somewhat dismantled--he sought his lady-love in haste, but, alas! he was months too late; she had already been summoned to another home,--the beautiful Rose O’Hara, his heart’s desire, was dead. This was said to have been Sir Richard’s sole love-affair, and the one grief of his life. The late baronet’s reckless extravagance had shattered the fortunes of his descendants; his heir found himself compelled to let the land, close the Hall, sell off the horses, and take up his abode with his mother in the town house in Queen’s Gate; where he lived and how, was indifferent to him, he seemed to have no heart for anything. This was attributed to his supreme disgust at inheriting such a legacy of debt; but the real truth was that the loss of the beautiful Rose had temporarily stunned her lover. Lady Wynyard, once a celebrated beauty, was now a weak and withered old dowager, tyrannically ruled by her servants. When she, too, was carried to the ancestral vault, her son still remained in the gloomy family abode, and, more from apathy than anything else, fell under the thrall of her retainers. Between his father’s and his mother’s debts, Sir Richard found himself sorely pressed, and he took Martin Kesters, his schoolfellow and friend, into his confidence. “I shall be a crippled man all my life,” he declared; “it will take years to nurse the property into anything like what it was in my grandfather’s day; and, by that time, that young chap, Owen, will step into my shoes.” “Well, Dick, if you don’t mind a bit of risk,” said his companion, “I know a thing that will set you on your legs and make your fortune; but it’s not absolutely certain. Still, if it comes off, you get five hundred per cent. for your money, and become a semi-millionaire. It’s an Australian gold-mine, and I believe it’s going to boom!”