A nice, amiable trait to have to record; and yet many a very agreeable fellow, owner of all the pleasant things Fortune reserves for her especial favourites, might not be one whit more agreeable, or contented, or genial than Arthur Dudley, if luck took a notion some fine morning of leaving him out at elbows. Only people cannot exactly comprehend this truth; and, as a consequence, Arthur’s neighbours had long been sick of his airs and tempers, as they styled his resolution to keep himself to himself. Lord Kemms, for instance, would once have been glad enough to see him at the Park; but Arthur rejected all that nobleman’s well-intended civilities; and thus, as the years went by, the Squire was reduced to that most uncomfortable of all positions, viz., having a mere speaking acquaintance with his neighbours, whom he could not avoid meeting occasionally, and who really came in time to feel, as Compton Raidsford said, “out of patience with the fellow.” And yet, looking at Berrie Down, which stood on its sunny hill, smilingly nestling amid trees and plantations with rich green pastures intervening between it and Moorlands, both Lord Kemms and Mr. Raidsford were thinking pityingly of the owner, and wishing Arthur had been like anybody else. It was impossible for them to have talked about Mr. Black, and Mr. Black’s scheme, without bringing Squire Dudley’s name into the discussion also; indeed, Mr. Raidsford had instanced him as one of the men most likely to be led into trouble on the strength of Lord Kemms’ name; “for, although he may be too proud to visit at Kemms Park, my lord,” finished the owner of Moorlands, “he will not be too proud to follow your lead, if he believe you are taking the road to fortune.” After which followed a pause, a thoughtful pause, that lasted long enough to give Lord Kemms ample leisure to frame his ideas into some sort of definite shape, if they ever were to be got into shape at all. And yet when he broke silence, it was not directly of Mr. Black’s scheme he spoke. “I cannot help thinking,” he said, “about Dudley’s manner when he sold that mare to me to-day. I never saw him resemble a human being so much before. The way in which he put down Black was splendid; I could like the fellow, if he would get down off his stilts, and be a little natural.” “There is good in him, I believe,” was Mr. Raidsford’s reply; “and as for his wife, she is charming; I hope he won’t bring her and the little ones to grief. Have you ever seen his eldest child—the girl, I mean?” “Yes;—will make a pretty woman, like her mother. A strange child; not in the least shy,” added his lordship, with a smile.