“What does John Vane want with Innocent?” said Frederick, his tone changing. He got up from his chair, and slightly pushed away his mother, who was still leaning over him. “Does he want to marry _her_ too?” “Does Mr. Vane want to marry some one else--too?” said Nelly instinctively, with an impulse for which next moment she was sorry. “You should know best,” said Frederick; and then he turned to his mother with that air of superior knowledge and virtue which he knew so well how to assume. “I told you when that man first came to the house that his character was very doubtful. He has always been a queer fellow. Had I thought that you would receive him almost into the family, and make so much of him, I should never have allowed him to come here at all.” “But, Frederick!--I have never seen anything in him that was not nice,” said Mrs. Eastwood, alarmed. “Oh, I daresay, mother. A man does not come into a lady’s drawing-room to show off his shady qualities; but I warned you to start with. There are many queer stories about him current among men. Ask Molyneux--I don’t think there is any love lost between him and John Vane.” “Is that the case, Nelly?” asked Mrs. Eastwood. Nelly felt to her dismay that a hot and angry blush--a blush not altogether of embarrassment, of something that felt like passion--covered her face. “I should be sorry to quote Ernest on any such subject,” she said, faltering yet eager. “He told me that there were stories current among men about Sir Alexis, that he was not a man to be brought into your house, into my company----” (“What impertinence! one of my oldest friends!”) said Mrs. Eastwood, in a parenthesis. “And then,” continued Nelly, “he turned round upon me, and laughed at my knowing such things, when I told you, mamma. He made me out to be a gossip, to be fond of disagreeable reports; he made me feel as if I had made it up; that is how men show their friendship for each other. Probably both Frederick and he would do the same about Mr. Vane.” “Molyneux would be flattered by your opinion of him,” said Frederick, laughing; and had it not been for the lucky arrival of Dick and Jenny, I do not know how far the quarrel might have gone. Mrs. Eastwood, however, would not have “the boys” made parties to any discussion of this kind, and Frederick departed after a time to his office, where he was so very hard worked, poor fellow, and where he appeared between twelve and one o’clock, having settled his domestic affairs first, as became a Briton of the most “domesticated” race in the world.