And so, leaving Gerald's wife in her new home, he went back to his work. He, Hamish Channing, with his good looks and his courtly presence, was treading the streets gaily on the following morning. Many a man, pressing on to business, spared a moment to turn and glance at him, wondering who the fine, handsome fellow was, with the bright and good face. It was a face that would be bright always, bright in dying; but it had more than two shades of care on it today. For if any one living man hated, more than another, to inflict pain and disappointment, it was Hamish Channing. He was carrying back Gerald's manuscript, and had no good report to give of it. However clever Gerald might be at dashing off slashing articles in the review line, he would never be able to succeed in fiction. This first attempt proved it indisputably to Hamish Channing. The story was unconnected, the plot scarcely distinguishable, and there were very grave faults besides, offending against morality and good taste. Not one reader in fifty, and that must be some school-girl, inveterate after novels, could get through the first volume. Certainly, in plunging into a long work of fiction, Gerald Yorke had mistaken his vocation. How entirely different this crude and worthless book was from the high-class work Hamish was writing, his cheeks glowed to contemplate. Not in triumph over Gerald; never a tarnish of such a feeling could lie in his generous heart; but at the consciousness of his own capability, the gift given him by God, and what the work would be to the public. But that he deemed it lay in his duty, in all kindliness, not to deceive Gerald, he would not have told him the truth; no, in spite of the promise exacted of him to give a just, unvarnished report. Gerald sat at breakfast, in a flowery dressing-gown, in the rooms he was pleased to call his chambers, his breakfast and its appointments perfect. Silver glittered on the table, its linen was of the fairest damask, the chocolate and cream sent its aroma aloft. Gerald's taste was luxurious: he could not have lived upon a sovereign a-week as Roland was doing: perhaps Roland had never learnt to do it but for that renowned voyage of his. "Halloa, Hamish, old fellow! What brings you here so early?" "Oh, one or two matters," answered Hamish, keeping the manuscript out of sight at first, for he really shrank from having to report of it. "I was not sure you would be up." "I had to be up early this morning. Tell your news out, Hamish; I suppose the gist of it is that Winny is in a state of rebellion. Stay! I'll send the things away. One has no appetite after a Star-and-Garter dinner and pipes to wind up with till three in the morning. You have breakfasted?" "An hour ago."