“He has so much to ask you about, besides,” she went on. “Mamma wants him to let his Wiltshire house for some years, and so retrench a little, for you know he has been rather extravagant lately.” “I have ventured on an occasional remonstrance myself, though not without feeling what a liberty I was taking.” “A liberty! Surely, my dear Mr. M’Kinky, the kind solicitude of friendship is not a liberty. Then there have been some mines--lead or copper, I forget which, and I don’t well remember whether in South Wales or Sardinia--but they have not turned out well.” “Very badly, indeed, Miss Courtenay; the shares are at thirty-two, and falling still.” “Yes; he will have to talk over all these things with you; but not for some days, of course, for he is very weak and low.” “You don’t seem to know, then,” said he, with a smile, “that I am going off to-night; my horses are ordered for ten o’clock.” “Impossible! Why, we have not seen you yet; surely, Mr. M’Kinlay, you couldn’t leave this without seeing Gervais and my sister?” There was a reproachful tenderness in her look, and mingled expression of wounded sensibility and shame at its being confessed, that gave some trouble to the lawyer’s heart; for there rankled in that crafty old heart some memories of the conversation at Dalradern; and, in his distrust-fulness, he would ask himself, “What does this mean?” “Come, Mr. M’Kinlay, say this is only a threat; do confess it was only meant to terrify.” “Oh, Miss Georgina, you cannot attach such interest to my presence here, as to speak of my departure in terms like these!” “I don’t know how others think of these things,” said she, with a sort of pouting air, “but, for my own part, I cling very closely to old friendships.” [Illustration: 283] Had Mr. M’Kinlay been some twenty years younger, he would, doubtless, have seized on the moment to make a declaration. The conjuncture promised well, and he would not have lost it; but Mr. M’Kinlay had arrived at the time of life in which men are more prone to speculate on the consequences of failure than on the results of success, and when they never address them to jump over the narrowest ditch without a thought of the terrible splashing they shall get if they fall in, and, worse even than the wetting, the unsympathising comments of a malicious public. “What is Mr. M’Kinlay pondering over so deeply?” said Georgina, as she turned her eyes full upon him; and very effective eyes they were at such a range. “I can scarcely tell; that is, I don’t well know now to tell,” said he, trying to screw up his courage. “Mr. M’Kinlay has a secret, I’m certain,” said she, with a winning coquetry she was quite mistress of. That look she gave--it-was a long-dwelling look as though she had half forgotten, to take away her eyes, for ladies will sometimes fire after the enemy has struck--was too much for Mr. M’Kinlay; he forgot all his prudential reserves, and said, “Has not every one his secret, Miss Courtenay?”