"Are you going to tell them, Frank?" Francis had his mouth full and could only say "Hum! Ha!" "What is it?" Frederic turned a little pale and wondered what was coming. His misdeeds, taken collectively, were very trivial, but he knew from experience that any one of them taken singly, robbed of its context and placed under the scrutiny of other eyes, would assume gigantic proportions. "Have all the Folkestone Folyats died and left us all their money? Or has uncle William come back from India with a gigantic fortune?" Minna was rushing wildly ahead on all the strangest possibilities when Francis finished his mouthful and cleared his throat. "No," he said. "I have heard from your brother Serge." "Serge!" said Mary. "Serge!" said Gertrude, snatched from her tender dreams. "Is he rich?" asked Minna. "I don't know. He talks of coming home." "Where is he?" This came from Frederic. "He wrote from Durban in South Africa." "Oh! Then of course he's a millionaire. Hurrah! He'll buy Frederic a partnership, and me a husband--catch me marrying a poor man--and Mary a genuine Strad, and Gertie a--an acolyte." Gertrude flushed hotly and looked daggers across the table. "He merely writes that he is coming home, as though he had only been away a week." "Some of you children can hardly remember him," said Martha. Minna said she could just recollect his putting her into a bassinette and letting her go flying down a hill into a pond. Francis went on: "He sent your mother some water-colour drawings." "Any good?" asked Frederic. "I think they're quite good. But I don't know anything about these things." "I'll take them to old Lawrie. He'll know," said Frederic. "Lawrie?" murmured Gertrude. "Yes. D'you know him?" "No. No." Minna winked at Frederic. He had often talked to her about old Lawrie, and she had discovered that the name of the young acolyte at St. Saviour's was Bennett Lawrie, old James' third son. "I say," said Frederic, "does Serge know we're here?" "No. The letter was forwarded from St. Withans." "Don't you think you ought to let him know what he's in for?" "I can't do that. He gave no address." "It won't matter to him if he's rich," said Minna, and they all fell to and rummaged their memories for recollections of Serge as a boy. Minna invented lavishly and suddenly she shouted: "Did he say whether he'd got a wife?" "I bet it's a blackamoor like old Nicholas Folyat," said Frederic. "Even if she is black," said Mrs. Folyat solemnly, "if he is married to her she will be my daughter-in-law and I shall receive her." The conversation took on a broad complexion which is more permissible in the family circle than in the printed page.