And, having poured out this persuasive little harangue with such volubility that not even an Irishman could get in a word edgeways, Fabian allowed himself to be enticed on to the platform, and began asking me questions about myself with childlike affection. Maurice Browne followed, somewhat refreshed by this torrent of abuse, since the aim of his literary ambition was rather to scandalise than to convince. He was tall, thin, and unhealthy-looking, with a pallid face and pink-rimmed eyes, and an appearance altogether unfortunate in the propagator of a new cult. I believe he was, on the whole, fonder of me than Fabian was. My disastrous ugliness appealed to his distaste for the beautiful, and having once, as a complete stranger, very generously come to my aid in a difficulty, he felt ever after the natural and kindly human liking for a fellow-creature who has given one an opportunity of posing as the deputy of God. These two gentlemen, with their strong and aggressive opinions, formed the disturbing element in our yearly meeting, and, each being always at deadly feud with somebody else, might be reckoned on to keep the fun alive. Both talked to me, and me alone, on our way to the house, with such sly hits at one another as their wit or their malice could suggest. Fabian raved about the effects of descending sun on heather and pine-covered hills, Maurice Browne bemoaned the stony poverty of the cottages, and opined that constant intermarriages between the inhabitants had reduced the scanty population to idiots. Then Fabian told me how many inquiries had been made about me by old acquaintances, who still hoped I would some day return from the wilds, and Maurice instantly tempered my satisfaction by asking me if I had heard that the Earl of Saxmundham was going to divorce his wife. The question gave me a great shock, not so much on account of the blow it dealt at an old idol still conventionally enthroned in my memory as the last love of my life, as because I knew how much distress such a report must cause to poor old Edgar. I was quite relieved, on entering the drive, to meet my stalwart friend and his faithful companion, both very merry over some joke which had already made Mr. Fussell purple in the face. On seeing us they burst out laughing afresh. I guessed what the joke was. 'Deuced lonely up here, isn't it?' said Mr. Fussell to me. 'No society, nothing but books, books,--except for one short fortnight in the year. Eh, Maude?' 'Eh? eh? what's this?' said Fabian. 'His only books are woman's looks, and I wonder they didn't teach him the folly of bringing a band of gay and dashing cavaliers to read them too,' said Edgar. Fabian turned slowly round to me, with a look of extreme pain, and shook his head mournfully. 'Oh, what a tangled web we weave,' he murmured sorrowfully, and then began to dance the Highland fling, with his rug tartanwise over his shoulder.