"Gently! I won't sit and hear John Huish maligned like that."

"Maligned!" cried Morrison, with a bitter laugh.

"As if anyone could say anything bad enough of the scoundrel!"

"Look here, Frank," said d.i.c.k rather warmly, "I came here to try and do you a good turn, not to hear John Huish backbitten. He's a good, true-hearted fellow, who has been slandered up and down, and he don't deserve it."

Morrison sat up, stared at him in wonder, and then burst into a scornful laugh.

"d.i.c.k Millet," he exclaimed, "you called me a fool a little while ago.

I won't call you so, only ask you whether you don't think you are one."

"I dare say I am," said d.i.c.k sharply. "But look here, are you prepared to prove all this about John Huish?"

"Every bit of it, and ten times as much," said Morrison. "Why, this scoundrel won or cheated me of the money that paid for his wedding trip.

He was with me till the last instant. Yes, and, as well as I can recollect, after he had got your sister away."

d.i.c.k's cigar went out, and his forehead began to pucker up.

"Look here," he said: "you told me that he sent you the note that made you go home that night. Where were you?"

"At a supper with some actresses."

"But John Huish was not there!"

"Not there. Why, he was present with the lady who was his companion up to the time that he honoured your sister with his name. I believe he visits her now."

"I can't stand this," cried d.i.c.k, throwing away his cigar. "How a fellow who calls himself a man can play double in this way gets over me.

Frank Morrison, if I did as much I should feel as if I had 'liar'

written on my face, ready for my wife to see. It's too much to believe about John Huish. I can't--I won't have it. Why, it would break poor little Gerty's heart."

"Break her heart!" said Morrison bitterly. "Perhaps she would take a leaf out of her sister's book."

"Confound you, Frank Morrison!" cried d.i.c.k, in a rage, as he jumped up and faced his brother-in-law. "I won't stand it. My two sisters are as pure as angels. Do you dare to tell me to my face that you believe Renee guilty?"

There was a dead silence in the room, and at last Frank Morrison spoke.

"d.i.c.k," he said, and his voice shook, "you are a good fellow. You are right: I am a fool and a scoundrel."

"Yes," cried d.i.c.k; "but do you dare to tell me you believe that of Renee?"

"I'd give half my life to know that she was innocent," groaned Morrison.

"You are a fool, then," cried d.i.c.k, "or you'd know it. There, I didn't come to quarrel, but to try and make you both happy; and now matters are ten times worse. But I won't believe this about John."

"It's true enough," said Morrison sadly. "Poor little la.s.s! I liked Gertrude. You should not have let that scoundrel have her."

"We have a weakness for letting our family marry scoundrels."

"Yes," said Morrison, speaking without the slightest resentment; "she had better have had poor Lord Henry Moorpark."

"Oh!" said d.i.c.k. "There, I'm going. 'Day."

He moved towards the door, but Morrison stopped him.

"d.i.c.k," he said; "did Renee know you were coming?"

"No," was the curt reply.

"Is she--is she still at your uncle's?"

"Yes, nearly always."

"Is she--is she well?"

"No. She is ill. Heartsick and broken; and if what you say is true, she will soon have poor Gerty to keep her company."

d.i.c.k Millet hurried away from his brother-in-law's house, pondering upon his own love matters, and telling himself that he had more to think of than he could bear.

In happy ignorance of her ladyship's prostrate state, John Huish, soon after his brother-in-law's departure, hurried off to pay a hasty visit to his club, where he asked to see the secretary, and was informed that that gentleman was out. He threw himself into a cab, looking rather white and set of countenance as he had himself driven to Finsbury Square, where Daniel looked at him curiously as he ushered him into the doctor's room.

"My dear, dear boy, I am glad!" cried the doctor, dashing down his gla.s.ses. "You did the old lady, after all, and carried the little darling off. Bless her heart! Why, the gipsy! Oh, won't I talk to her about this. That's the best thing I've known for years. What does your father say?"

"He wrote me word that he was very glad, and said he should write to Gertrude's uncle."

"Ah, yes. H'm!" said the doctor. "Best thing, too. They were once very great friends, John."

"Yes, I have heard so," said Huish. "I think Captain Millet loved my mother."

"H'm, yes," said the doctor, nodding. "They quarrelled. Well, but this is a surprise! You dog, you! But the secrecy of the whole thing! How snug you kept it! But, I say, you ought to have written to us all."

"Well, certainly, I might have written to you, doctor, but I confess I forgot."

"I say, though, you should have written to the old man."

"We did, letter after letter."

"Then that old--there, I won't say what, must have suppressed them. She was mad because her favourite lost. It would have been murder to have tied her up to that wreck. I say, though, my boy," continued the doctor seriously, "I don't think you ought to have carried on so with Frank Morrison. He has had D.T. terribly."

"What had that to do with me?" said Huish. "If a man will drink, he must take the consequences."

"Exactly," said the doctor coldly; "but his friends need not egg him on so as to win his money."

"He should not choose scoundrels for his companions," said Huish coldly.

"H'm, no, of course not," said the doctor, coughing, and hurrying to change the conversation. "By the way, why didn't you tell me all this when you came last?"

"How could I?" said Huish, smiling. "I was not a prophet."