When I got back to town, however, matters had moved fast, and plans were cut and dried. Lascelles had come to the conclusion that if I were out of the way his suit would prosper, and he had grown to like the little widow as much as a person of his importance could care for anyone who did not wear his clothes. My father and he had, therefore, set to work with a burst of Irish zeal, and had succeeded in getting me made a kind of probationary attaché at the Madrid Embassy; and expected me to be mightily pleased at the result of their innocent efforts on my behalf. My father told me the good news on my arrival, and the next morning there came the official confirmation. My father was in quite cheerful spirits. "Your foot is on the ladder, Ferdinand," he said, gleefully. He was very partial to this metaphor. Life to him was a maze of ladders, leading up and down and in all directions, of which, by the way, he had made very indifferent use. "You may climb where you will now, my boy. You’ve a steady head at times." "I trust I shall not be dizzied by the giddy height of this position, sir," I answered, not wholly without guile, for I was not enamoured of this prospective expatriation in the cause of fraternity. "I don’t think it’s a subject for feeble satire," exclaimed Lascelles, sourly. "You’ve not made such a brilliant success of things on your own account and during your years of vagrancy. I trust you’ll remember who you are now, and endeavour to do the family credit, and seek to climb the ladder which our father rightly says is open to you." "I hope you won’t marry a wretched Spanish woman to carry up with you," said Mercy, a little pungently. She resented my exile more than I did. "Such a remark is scarcely called for, Mercy," said Lascelles, always glad to pose as the much elder brother, and objecting to any reference to the subject of marriage at such a moment. But Mercy was as resentful as a nettle when handled tactlessly. "You mean we ought to taboo the subject of marriage just at present. Very well, dear," she said, demurely and humbly. My brother frowned and fidgetted on his chair, while I shut down a smile. "Madrid has a questionable climate, but I believe it is excellent for young strong men," said my father, obviously glad that he had not to go. "It is fortunate you have such a knowledge of Spanish, Ferdinand. It was that which turned the scale in your favour. Sir John Cullingworth told me so. It’s what I’ve always said; all boys should know a language or two. Always lifts a man a rung or two above the crowd when the moment comes. A most valuable mental equipment." A perfect knowledge of Spanish, the result of years of my boyhood and youth spent in Spain, was the one ewe lamb of my accomplishments; that, and a bad pass degree at Oxford constituted the "valuable mental equipment" of my father’s imagination. "It has come in handy this time, sir," I assented.