My father remained unmarried for nearly two years after the death of his first wife, and their son must have been nineteen when the bright eyes and graceful manners of Lady Mary De Burgh captivated the disconsolate widower, still young and handsome enough to please the fancy and interest the heart of a girl, only some few months older than his heir. I have but slight recollection of my mother. I was the youngest, and she did not survive my birth more than three years; both my sister and myself were extremely like her, and adored by my father, who never could, even in his childhood, caress so rigidly orthodox a young gentleman as his eldest son. Egerton was a thing apart, and belonged to his country and the peerage; but we were the darlings of his heart; spoiled children, reared in luxury and indulgence. How well I remember the bitter and passionate grief with which I received the intelligence of his death, and the choking sobs that interrupted my reproaches to Egerton, for not sending for me in time to let me hear his voice once more, feeling that every unconscious game of cricket in which I had joined while he lay struggling between life and death was an unnatural piece of levity, unpardonable! All this passed over soon, and my life was happy enough, but Mary used often to look sad, and was very glad to marry Wentworth, though he was a good deal older than herself. The large fortune my father's first wife brought him was, of course, settled on her children, so Mary and I had but the slender portions usually allotted to the younger Egertons, but mine was doubled by her husband's refusal to accept hers. This is more than I meant to have stated about myself, but it was necessary to show my position. A cold raw damp November day, with occasional dashes of heavy rain, the leafless trees bending before the sudden gusts of wind that accompanied them; and every object ten yards off shrouded in a dark fog that seemed to blend heaven and earth in one equable gloom. I shivered as I drew up the windows of the cab into which I had thrown myself at the railway station, near Allerton, observing how strongly the conveyance appeared to partake of the general humidity. The avenue seemed interminable; and when at length my humble vehicle drew up before the portico, I received the pleasing intelligence, "my Lord is not at home, Captain Egerton, but will you please to walk in?" "Why, yes! I intend stopping here for the night; and, Barnard, get me some mulled port, will you, lots of spice, and hot as the Devil."