Sir George Repington raised his eyebrows and seemed about to make a severe comment upon this halting explanation, but, leaning his elbow on the table and his cheek on his hand, he changed his mind and in cold deliberate accents, so cold and so deliberate that you would have sworn a weight of emotion was sunk beneath them, began a tale. Since this tale must either be told by me or by Sir George himself, inasmuch as it concerns one or two of our characters, I will let the original author give it to you in his own words, nay I will give the story the distinction of a chapter to itself. _Chapter the Thirty-first_ A TALE WITH AN INTERRUPTED MORAL Sir George Repington filled up his glass (he was drinking Port wine), motioned Phyllida to a seat on the right, sat himself down opposite, and, to the accompaniment of thunder and lightning and wind and rain, proceeded to entertain her with some vastly interesting details of his domestick history. "I have already shown you the portrait of my sister Joan, and you will remember that I remarked upon the resemblance between you and her--I did not think at the time that such a coincidence would fulfil itself even more completely. "We were left orphans soon after I reached my twenty-fifth birthday, and I will admit that I experienced a keen sensation of pride in the responsibleness of a great financial house and a very attractive young woman. Pray, remember I was still young. We lived when we were in London at a pleasant house in Soho Square, on the side nearest to the Oxford Road, but spent much of our leisure at Repington Hall, a fine old family mansion in the county of Surrey, near enough to the town to make our visits there very frequent." Sir George sighed at the pleasant memories as he sipped his glass of Port wine.