Hampstead of course obeyed his father's injunctions, and went down to Trafford instantly, leaving his sister alone at Hendon Hall. He found the Marquis not in bed indeed, but confined to his own sitting-room, and to a very small bed-chamber which had been fitted up for him close to it. Mr. Greenwood had been anxious to give up his own rooms as being more spacious; but the offer had been peremptorily and almost indignantly refused. The Marquis had been unwilling to accept anything like a courtesy from Mr. Greenwood. Should he make up his mind to turn Mr. Greenwood out of the house,--and he had almost made up his mind to do so,--then he could do what he pleased with Mr. Greenwood's rooms. But he wasn't going to accept the loan of chambers in his own house as a favour from Mr. Greenwood. Hampstead on arriving at the house saw the Marchioness for a moment before he went to his father. "I cannot tell how he is," said Lady Kingsbury, speaking in evident dudgeon. "He will hardly let me go near him. Doctor Spicer seems to think that we need not be alarmed. He shuts himself up in those gloomy rooms down-stairs. Of course it would be better for him to be off the ground floor, where he would have more light and air. But he has become so obstinate, that I do not know how to deal with him." "He has always liked to live in the room next to Mr. Greenwood's." "He has taken an absolute hatred to Mr. Greenwood. You had better not mention the poor old gentleman's name to him. Shut up as I am here, I have no one else to speak a word to, and for that reason, I suppose, he wishes to get rid of him. He is absolutely talking of sending the man away after having had him with him for nearly thirty years." In answer to all this Hampstead said almost nothing. He knew his stepmother, and was aware that he could do no service by telling her what he might find it to be his duty to say to his father as to Mr. Greenwood, or on any other subject. He did not hate his stepmother,--as she hated him. But he regarded her as one to whom it was quite useless to speak seriously as to the affairs of the family. He knew her to be prejudiced, ignorant, and falsely proud,--but he did not suppose her to be either wicked or cruel. His father began almost instantly about Mr. Greenwood, so that it would have been quite impossible for him to follow Lady Kingsbury's advice on that matter had he been ever so well minded. "Of course I'm ill," he said; "I suffer so much from sickness and dyspepsia that I can eat nothing. Doctor Spicer seems to think that I should get better if I did not worry myself; but there are so many things to worry me. The conduct of that man is abominable." "What man, sir?" asked Hampstead,--who knew, however, very well what was coming. "That clergyman," said Lord Kingsbury, pointing in the direction of Mr. Greenwood's room. "He does not come to you, sir, unless you send for him?" "I haven't seen him for the last five days, and I don't care if I never see him again."