“There is a kind of open-air manner which suggests truthfulness,” admitted Mr. Colfox. “Yet there have been dark deeds done by sailors; there have been black sheep even in the Queen’s Navee. However, I believe Captain Hulbert is worthy of your good opinion. I have never heard anybody speak against him, and the old people who knew him as a lad seem to have liked him better than Lord Lostwithiel.” “Do tell me your opinion of Lord Lostwithiel. I am very curious about him. Mr. Crowther talked of him so much the night we were at Glenaveril.” “Mr. Crowther loves a lord.” “Please satisfy my curiosity. Is he really such a fascinating personage?” “He has very pleasant manners. I don’t know what constitutes fascination in a man, though I know pretty well what it means in a woman. Lord Lostwithiel’s manners are chiefly distinguished by repose without languor or affectation--and by an interest in other people so cleverly simulated that it deceives everybody. One finds him out by the way in which people boast of his friendship. He cannot be so attached to all the world. He has a manner which is generally described as sympathetic.” “Mr. Crowther enlarged a good deal upon his lordship’s admiration for my sister at the Hunt Ball. Was that so very marked?” Mr. Colfox coloured violently at this direct question--assuredly not easy to answer truthfully without hazard of offence. “I was not at the ball--I--I heard people talk a little--in the way people talk of everything--about Lostwithiel’s attention to Mrs. Disney, and about her prettiness--they all agreed that if not the loveliest woman in the room, she was at least the most interesting.” “It was very natural that he should admire her; but I don’t think Martin liked Mr. Crowther’s talking about it in that way, at the dinner-table. The man is horridly underbred. Has Lord Lostwithiel what you call--” she hesitated a little--“a good character?” “I don’t know about the present. I have heard that in the past his reputation was not altogether good.” “I understand,” said Allegra, quickly. “The admiration of such a man is an insult; and that is why Mr. Crowther harped upon the fact. I am sure he is a malevolent man.” “Don’t be hard upon him, Miss Leland. I believe he has only the misfortune to be a cad--a cad by birth, education, and associations. Don’t fling your stone at such a man--consider what an unhappy fate it is.” “Oh, but he does not think himself unhappy. He is bursting with self-importance and the pride of riches. He is the typical rich man of the Psalmist. He must be the happiest man in Trelasco, a thick-skinned man whom nothing can hurt.” “I am sorry you think so badly of poor Mr. Crowther, because I am really attached to his wife. She is one of the best women I know.” “So my sister tells me, and I was very much taken with her myself, but one cannot afford to be friendly with Mrs. Crowther at the cost of knowing her husband.”