"Likely enough, my dear boy!" said Kilsyth, coming to his rescue, as he floundered about in a way very unusual to him. "Likely enough! I never did care particularly for a good many of your pursuits, you know, Ronald, though I tried very hard at one time--when you were quite a lad, I recollect--to understand them and share in them. But that was not to be. I was not bright enough. I'm of the old school, and what we old fellows cared about seems to have died out with our youth, and never to have interested anybody ever since. I don't say this complainingly--not in the least--but it was deuced odd. However, I'm very glad I've met you, Ronald, for I have long wished--and lately, within the last few days more especially--to have a talk with you, a serious talk, my boy, which will take up some little time. Have you half-an-hour you can give me now? I shall be very glad if you have." It was coming at last. He had but put off the evil day, and now it was upon him. Well--better to hear himself condemned by his father than by anyone else. Let it come. "My time is yours, sir," said Ronald, almost echoing Wilmot, as he remembered, on the day of that eventful interview in Charles-street. "I shall of course be delighted to give my best attention to anything you may have to say." "Well, then, let's take a turn in the Park opposite," said Kilsyth, hooking his arm into his son's. "Not among the people there, where we should be perpetually interrupted by having to speak to those folks who bail one so good-naturedly at every step, but away on the grass there, by ourselves." The two men passed through the Albert Gate, and turning to the right, struck on to the piece of turf lying between the Row and the Drive. A few children were playing about, a few nurse-maids were here and there gossiping together; else they had it all to themselves. "I want to talk to you," commenced Kilsyth, "about your sister--about Maddy. I have been a good deal to Squab-street in the last few weeks, and I've thought Maddy looks anything but as I should wish her to look. Has that struck you, Ronald?" "I--I'm sorry to say that I haven't seen Madeleine for some little time, sir. The business which, as I just explained to you, has prevented my coming to Brook-street has equally prevented me from calling on her." "Of course, yes! I beg pardon--I forgot! Well, Maddy looks anything but well. For a long time past--indeed ever since her marriage--she has been singularly low-spirited and dull; very unlike her usual self." "I don't know that that is much to be wondered at. Madeleine was always a peculiar girl, in the sense that she had an extraordinary attachment for her home; and the fact of being parted from you, with whom all her life has been passed, and to whom she is devotedly attached, may explain the cause of any little temporary lowness of spirits."