Edward laughed uneasily. "What!" he said. "Oh, she's all right. A bit fuf--funny in her manner. That's all." Mr. Caspar prodded his son. "You'd better mind your eye, Ned. She's masterful, and a fine figure of a woman too." Edward tittered foolishly. "What?--Oh, she--she's married. Children and all that." "What's her husband do?" "What--him?--Oh, he does nothing much that I know of." "Lives on her, I suppose," growled the other. "Scoundrel! I know the sort. The kind your Gladstones encourage." He descanted at length and with more than even his usual violence on the sins of all governments and especially radical ones. Unlike his usual self, he was clearly talking as a screen to gain time, sheltering something behind a wall of words. Ned was always embarrassed in his father's presence; but for once Mr. Caspar seemed himself uneasy in the presence of this son who had been such a woeful disappointment to him. After his political outburst, there was a prolonged pause. Then Mr. Caspar leaned forward and kicked a cinder into its place. "Pretty comfortable here?" he asked at last. "Oh, I get along fuf--first-rate," answered the son. "Three hundred a year's not much for a man in my position to allow his only son, I know," the other said gruffly. It was a new and unexpected note. The young man, chivalrous to the roots of him, and heir to all the qualities of his mother's family, instantly answered his father's mute appeal. "My dear fuf--father, it's a fortune," he said. "We--I live like a prince. And anyway, it's three hundred a year more than I deserve." His father was silent. "I don't know if you've had any expectations from me," he said at last. "I've been pretty blunt with you in the past." The young man had risen and was standing before the fire, his face working. "I've no need for mum--much money," he explained. "You see I've no expensive tastes. I don't hunt or shoot or gug--gamble. If I can have enough for the necessities of life, and to buy an occasional bub--book or two, that's all I need." "Ned," said the other, coming firmly to the point, "I've made arrangements for the three hundred a year I allow you to be continued throughout your life." "I think it's mum--most _awfully_ good of you, father," said the young man with obvious sincerity. The other grunted. "I don't know," he replied. "Not every son would take it that way." He was rarely moved. His son saw it and was wretched. Then the woman came in with luncheon. CHAPTER V ERNIE MAKES HIS APPEARANCE The little room in which they lunched looked out on a tiny back-garden bounded by a high old flint-wall.