His mind occupied with such thoughts as these, Arthur Hazlehurst passed a sleepless night, and the first moment he could tear himself away from business on the following day, he betook himself to Park Lane. Kate was from home when he arrived; but having notified to the servant his intention of awaiting her return, he was shown into the drawing-room, where he found a tall, fashionably-dressed young man standing in a disconsolate attitude by the fire-place, to whom he made a slight inclination of the head, heartily wishing him at Jericho, or any other locality equally remote from Park Lane; then, taking up a book, he left him to his own devices. Things remained in this thoroughly English and unsociable state for about ten minutes, towards the end of which period the fashionable young man, having stared hard at Hazlehurst, grew first interested, then excited, and finally the spirit moved him, and he spake:-- “I beg pardon--a--really I don’t think I can be mistaken--a--very absurd, I’m sure, if I am--but I was at school with one Arthur Hazlehurst--and--” “And I am he,” was the reply; “but you have the advantage of me; for I was at school with some four hundred boys, and, to tell you the honest truth, it does not at this moment occur to me which of them you may have been.” “Yet Alfred Courtland has to thank you for such slight skill as he may possess in the noble arts of boot-cleaning, brushing clothes, and frying sausages; besides early lessons in the demolition of oysters and porter--enforced by example rather than precept,” was the rejoinder; and, the unsocial ice of Old England being thus broken, the _ci-devant_ school-fellows talked on until they grew quite intimate. At length, Lord Alfred looked at his watch, was silent and _distrait_ for a minute or two, then began in a timid, hesitating voice, “I was waiting here to see Mrs. Crane; but, I don’t know--that is, I feel as if I could tell you all about it quite as well; you can do what I wish better than she could; and I don’t think you’ll be angry with me when I’ve made you understand the affair.” “Suppose you come to the point, and try to do so at once,” replied Arthur, anxious to get him away, if possible, before Kate’s return.