Frank Maynard and Arthur Prescott, after leaving Stephen Walker standing bewildered upon the pavement, did not pursue their way along Knightsbridge, but turned at once into Lowndes Square. They walked the length of this, and stopped at one of the three or four houses which form the end of the square, or rather oblong. It belonged to Captain Bradshaw, Frank’s uncle, with whom the young men were going to dine. Harry Bradshaw was the younger of two brothers, sons of Reginald Bradshaw, of Wyvern Park, in Oxfordshire. It was a fine property. Indeed, there were not many finer in the county—with its noble old mansion, its wide park, and its stately trees—and had been in the family for centuries. During all this time—if tradition is to be believed—the Bradshaws had been a hearty, honest, hard-riding, and deep-drinking race; and Reginald did not belie his ancestry, but drank as deeply and rode as hard as the best of them could have done. But stately as was Wyvern Hall, and wide and fair as was its park, the Bradshaws were by no means a wealthy race. Previous to the rebellion they had been so, but the Bradshaw of that time had thrown himself heart and soul into the Royalist cause. He had lost everything but life, and lived abroad with his Prince in France, until, at the death of Cromwell, men once more shook off the iron Puritan yoke from their necks, and welcomed their King home again from his long exile. With him returned Marmaduke Bradshaw. More fortunate than many, he succeeded in regaining his family estate, and in ousting the pious corn-factor of the neighbouring town, who had, by the fervour and lengthiness of his prayers, and the strength of his right arm, fought and prayed himself into possession of the domain of the malcontent and godless follower of the man Stuart. But although Marmaduke succeeded in thus regaining possession of the mansion and park, he was not so fortunate as to the various outlying farms and properties. Some, indeed, he recovered, but the greater part were in the hands of surly iron-fisted men, who had won them on the fields of Marston and Naseby and Worcester, and who were by no means men to unclose their hands upon what they had once grasped. Force was not to be tried. The King was engaged in endeavouring to make himself popular to all parties, and had very difficult cards to play between them, Marmaduke Bradshaw, therefore, settled down in the family mansion with a greatly diminished rent roll, but still thinking himself lucky in comparison to many others, whose devotion in times of adversity to their King was but ill rewarded on his return to power.