work and eager anticipation of something from him, he took during the holidays the greatest interest in the boy, going out with him, sometimes riding, sometimes driving, sometimes to the meet, where Tom’s eagerness was scarcely to be restrained. Mr. Beaufort himself did not hunt. He was not an ungraceful horseman for a moderate and mild canter; but if he had ever been possessed of sufficient energy to follow the hounds, that energy had long left him. He did not dislike, however, to ride to the meet or drive his wife over, Tom accompanying them upon his pony. Lady Car thought it was nothing less than devotion to her son which induced him to depart from his studious seclusion on account of the boy. She was very grateful to her husband, yet deprecated gently. ‘You are so very, very good to Tom: but I cannot bear to think of all the sacrifices you are making for him, Edward, wasting your time which is so much too valuable to be thrown away upon a little boy.’ ‘I wish my time was more valuable, to show you how willingly I would give it up for anything belonging to you, Carry, not to say for your boy.’ ‘Oh thanks, thanks, dear Edward; but I can’t have you burdened with Tom.’ ‘I like it,’ he said. ‘I like--boys.’ It was almost too much for him to say that he liked this particular boy. ‘And Tom interests me very much,’ he added. Carry looked at him with a wistful curiosity. A gleam of colour passed over her face. Was it possible that Tom was interesting to such a man as Edward Beaufort? She felt guilty to ask herself that question. She had been afraid that Tom was not very interesting, not a child to attract any one much who did not belong to him. To be sure the child did belong to him, in a sort of a way. ‘So you like school, Tom,’ said Beaufort, looking down from his tall horse at the little fellow on his pony, strenuously keeping up with him. Had Beaufort been a more athletic person, he would have appreciated more the boy’s determination not to be left a step behind. ‘Well,’ said Tom, reflectively, ‘I like it, and I don’t like it. I think lessons are great rot.’ ‘Oh, do you?’ said his tall companion. ‘Don’t _you_, Beau? They don’t teach anything a fellow wants. What’s the good of Latin, let alone Greek? They’re what you call dead languages, and we don’t want what’s dead. When you’ve got to make your living by them it’s different, like Hall’s sons that are going to be the schoolmasters when he dies.’ ‘Did you think of all that by yourself, Tom?’ ‘No,’ said the boy after a stare of a moment, and some hesitation. ‘It wasn’t me, it was Harrison major. His father’s very rich, and he’s in trade. And Harrison says what’s the good of these things. You never want them. They’re only an excuse for sending in heavy bills, Harrison says.’ ‘He must be a great authority,’ said Mr. Beaufort gravely.