He knew well that as a rule it was not fitting that he should ask a married man without his wife; but there are occasions on which an excuse can be given, and upon the whole the men liked it. He was a stout, tall, portly old gentleman, sixty years of age, but looking somewhat older, whom it was a difficulty to place on horseback, but who, when there, looked remarkably well. He rarely rose to a trot during his two hours of exercise, which to the two attaché's who were told off for the duty of accompanying him was the hardest part of their allotted work. But other gentlemen would lay themselves out to meet Sir Magnus and to ride with him, and in this way he achieved that character for popularity which had been a better aid to him in life than all the diplomatic skill which he possessed. "What do you think?" said he, walking off with Mrs. Mountjoy's letter into his wife's room. "I don't think anything, my dear." "You never do." Lady Mountjoy, who had not yet undergone her painting, looked cross and ill-natured. "At any rate, Sarah and her daughter are proposing to come here." "Good gracious! At once?" "Yes, at once. Of course, I've asked them over and over again, and something was said about this autumn, when we had come back from Pimperingen." "Why did you not tell me?" "Bother! I did tell you. This kind of thing always turns up at last. She's a very good kind of a woman, and the daughter is all that she ought to be." "Of course she'll be flirting with Anderson." Anderson was one of the two mounted attachés. "Anderson will know how to look after himself," said Sir Magnus. "At any rate they must come. They have never troubled us before, and we ought to put up with them once." "But, my dear, what is all this about her brother?" "She won't bring her brother with her." "How can you be sure of that?" said the anxious lady. "He is dying, and can't be moved." "But that son of his--Mountjoy. It's altogether a most distressing story. He turns out to be nobody after all, and now he has disappeared, and the papers for an entire month were full of him. What would you do if he were to turn up here? The girl was engaged to him, you know, and has only thrown him off since his own father declared that he was not legitimate. There never was such a mess about anything since London first began."