The dining-room at the Hall was gloomy but grand. The walls dark, save where they were relieved by scrolls of gilding and ornamental panels, in which were set some full-length portraits of doubtful merit, and more than doubtful antiquity. It was divided, like the drawing-room, by pillars, not of marble, though they assumed that virtue, leaving a darker strait at each end, intended, no doubt, to throw up the brilliancy of the larger central room, in which stood the dinner-table with all its lights. And this might have been the case had there been a large and brilliant party round the table, and abundance of light, with reflections of silver and crystal, as probably the builder of the house intended should be the case. But now the Swinfords, mother and son, alone at a round table of no great size, with a shaded lamp suspended over it, furnished little more than an oasis in the great desert of darkness. There was, indeed, a large fire blazing, against which Mrs. Swinford sat, shivering from time to time, notwithstanding the mild softness of the April night. And the table was adorned with a great bouquet of flowers, dazzling white azaleas, and the other brilliant children of the spring who come in such a triumph over the footsteps of winter. Mrs. Swinford was dressed, as she always was, elaborately, and like a picture, in dark velvet, just showing a little colour here and there where the light caught it--and a great deal of lace. She had a lace scarf fastened over her head, fantastically indeed, and scarcely enough to have been allowed by Mrs. Plowden to pass muster as a cap, but still softening the age of the face, and the tower of the abundant dark hair piled unnaturally upon her head. She might have been a dethroned and indignant queen. She, and the flowers, and Leo’s more youthful face, gave a centre to the dark solemnity around, through which the servants moved noiseless. ‘You have been in the village,’ he said; ‘I hear, making calls.’ But this was not till the lengthened and elaborate dinner--of which both ate fastidiously, with many criticisms and remarks little complimentary to a very ambitious and highly-paid cook--was done. ‘I am glad you take so much interest in my movements, Leo, as to know.’ ‘Of course I know. I saw the carriage for one thing; and besides----’ ‘You, I suppose, were paying visits, too?’ ‘Not much,’ he said, with an embarrassed smile. ‘I saw little Miss Grey about some of our schemes; but you don’t give Miss Grey the light of your countenance.’ ‘I have never noticed any but the principal people--who, in case of an election or any public matter, might be useful.’ ‘I don’t see what an election would be to us.’ ‘Nor I, Leo. But it is part of our hereditary policy to keep the matter open, should you or any one of the family be of a different opinion.’