His daughter laughed lightly as she took her place beside him. It amused her greatly to be called “Miss Honor,” just as if she were a girl. And then he looked at, and spoke so kindly to her that she was already beginning to feel at home in the Stanwick-street lodging. With the large-boned, youthfully-dressed matron, dispensing with an air that was intended to be genteel, the ill-dressed, London-flavoured whiting from the scantily-filled dish before her, Honor did not expect to feel much kindred sympathy. Mrs. Norcott was, however, to judge from external appearances at least, good-natured, and _facile à vivre_. If she had ever enjoyed the prestige of being that often self-reliant and arrogant character yclept an heiress (a fact of the truth of which Honor began to doubt), there had as yet cropped out no signs either of a love of domination or a purse-proud spirit. A harmless vanity, joined to a blind worship for the Colonel, had hitherto struck Honor as the most distinguishing feature in the Australian lady’s idiosyncrasy. “If you can eat that stuff it’s more than I can,” said the master of the house, pushing away his plate with disgust. “You see, my dear child, what it is to have a father who hasn’t one shilling to rub against another. I--” “Now, Colonel, I am surprised to hear you talk in this way,” put in his wife. “There are a precious good many shillings in three hundred pounds a-year, or I am a good deal more out in my arithmetic than I think I am. The idea of talking in this way before your daughter! Why, she’ll think she’s come among beggars, to hear the way you’re going on.” Fred laughed sardonically. “Not much need to talk about it, I think. Those horrible whitings fried in black grease render all further explanation on the subject nugatory. I don’t suppose that any affectation of superfluity is likely to deceive Mrs. Beacham; and, in my opinion, it is always better to be plain-spoken. You’ve got a poor devil of a father, my dear child, who finds it hard enough, I can assure you, to make both ends meet. Of course you will be uncomfortable here, I expect _that_; but I do flatter myself that you won’t throw me over, Honor, because I’m a poor man. I’ve trusted in women all my life, and never had cause to repent it yet; so here’s your health, my dear, and may you enjoy health and wealth and happiness long after your poor old father has been laid under the sod.”