"So they have; I forgot. Well, St Columbs, or the Patent Fuel, or that humbug discovery of Patterson's,--the Irish Asphalt There's an American fellow, by the way, wants that."

"They're very low,--very low, all these, sir," said Hankes, lugubriously. "They sank so obstinately that I just withdrew our name quietly, so that we can say any day we have long ceased any connection with these enterprises."

"She 'll scarcely make any delay in Malta, Hankes. Your message ought to be there by Thursday at latest" And then, as if ashamed of showing where his thoughts were straying, he said, "All kinds of things--odds and ends of every sort--are jostling each other in my brain to-night."

"You want rest, sir; you want nine or ten hours of sound sleep."

"Do I look fatigued or harassed?" asked Dunn, with an eagerness that almost startled the other.

"A little tired, sir; not more than that," cautiously answered Hankes.

"But I don't _feel_ tired. I am not conscious of any weariness," said he, pettishly. "I suspect that you are not a very acute physiognomist, Hankes. I have told you," added he, hastily, "I shall want some twelve or fifteen thousand pounds soon. Look out, too, for any handsome country-seat--in the South, I should prefer it--that may be in the market I 'll not carry out my intentions about Kellett's Court. It is a tumble-down old concern, and would cost us more in repairs than a handsome house fit to inhabit."

"Am I to have the honor of offering my felicitations, sir?" said Hankes, obsequiously; "are the reports of the newspapers as to a certain happy event to be relied on?"

"You mean as to my marriage? Yes, perfectly true. I might, in a mere worldly point of view, have looked higher,--not higher, certainly not,--but I might have contracted what many would have called a more advantageous connection; in fact, I might have had any amount of money I could care for, but I determined for what I deemed the wiser course. You are probably not aware that this is a very long attachment. Lady Augusta and myself have been as good as engaged to each other for--for a number of years. She was very young when we met first,--just emerging from early girlhood; but the sentiment of her youthful choice has never varied, and, on _my_ part, the attachment has been as constant."

"Indeed, sir!" said Hankes, sorely puzzled what to make of this declaration.

"I know," said Dunn, returning rapidly to the theme, "that nothing will seem less credible to the world at large than a man of _my_ stamp marrying for love! The habit is to represent us as a sort of human monster, a creature of wily, money-getting faculties, shrewd, over-reaching, and successful. They won't give us feelings, Hankes. They won't let us understand the ties of affection and the charms of a home.

Well," said he, after a long pause, "there probably never lived a man more mistaken, more misconceived by the world than myself."

Hankes heaved a heavy sigh; it was, he felt, the safest thing he could do, for he did not dare to trust himself with a single word. The sigh, however, was a most profound one, and, plainly as words, declared the compassionate contempt he entertained for a world so short-sighted and so meanly minded.

"After all," resumed Dunn, "it is the penalty every man must pay for eminence. The poor little nibblers at the rind of fortune satisfy their unsuccess when they say, 'Look at him with all his money!'"

Another and deeper sigh here broke from Hankes, who was really losing all clew to the speaker's reflections.

"I'm certain, Hankes, you have heard observations of this kind five hundred times."

"Ay, have I, sir," answered he, in hurried confusion,--"five thousand!"

"Well, and what was your reply, sir? How did you meet such remarks?"

said Dunn, sternly.

"Put them down, sir,--put them down at once; that is, I acknowledged that there was a sort of fair ground; I agreed in thinking that, everything considered, and looking to what we saw every day around us in life--and Heaven knows it is a strange world, and the more one sees of it the less he knows--"

"I 'm curious to hear," said Dunn, with a stern fixedness of manner, "in what quarter you heard these comments on my character."

Hankes trembled from head to foot. He was in the witness-box, and felt that one syllable might place him in the dock.

"You never heard one word of the kind in your life, sir, and you _know_ it," said Dunn, with a savage energy of tone that made the other sick with fear. "If ever there was a man whose daily life refuted such a calumny, it was myself."

Dunn's emotions were powerful, and he walked the room from end to end with long and determined strides. Suddenly halting at last, he looked Hankes steadily in the face, and said,--

"It was the Kellett girl dared thus to speak of me, was it not? The truth, sir,--the truth; I _will_ have it out of you!"

"Well, I must own you are right. It was Miss Kellett."

Heaven forgive you, Mr. Hankes, for the lie, inasmuch as you never intended to tell it till it was suggested to you.

"Can you recall the circumstance which elicited this remark? I mean,"

said he, with an affected carelessness of manner, "how did it occur? You were chatting together,--discussing people and events, eh?"

"Yes, sir; just so."

"And she observed--Do you chance to remember the phrase she used?"

"I give you my word of honor I do not, sir," said Hankes, with a sincere earnestness.

"People who fancy themselves clever--and Miss Kellett is one of that number--have a trick of eliminating every trait of a man's character from some little bias,--some accidental bend given to his youthful mind.

I am almost certain--nay, I feel persuaded--it was by some such light that young lady read me. She had heard I was remarkable as a schoolboy for this, that, or t' other,--I saved my pocket-money, or lent it out at interest. Come, was it not with the aid of an ingenious explanation of this kind she interpreted me?"

Mr. Hankes shook his head, and looked blankly disconsolate.

"Not that I value such people's estimate of me," said Dunn, angrily.

"Calumniate, vilify, depreciate as they will, here I stand, with my foot on the first step of the peerage. Ay, Hankes, I have made my own terms; the first 'Gazette' after the new elections will announce Mr. Davenport Dunn as Lord Castledunn."

Hankes actually bounded on his chair. Had he been the faithful servant of some learned alchemist, watching patiently for years the wondrous manipulations and subtle combinations of his master, following him from crucible to crucible and from alembic to alembic, till the glorious moment when, out of smoke and vapor, the yellow glow of the long-sought metal gleamed before his eyes, he could not have regarded his chief with a more devoted homage.

Dunn read "worship" in every lineament of the other's face. It was as honest veneration as his nature could compass, and, sooth to say, the great man liked it, and sniffed his incense with the-air of Jove himself.

"I mean to take care of you, Hankes," said he, with a bland protectiveness. "I do not readily forget the men who have served me faithfully. Of course we must draw out of all our enterprises here. I intend at once to realize--yes, Hankes--to realize a certain comfortable sum and withdraw."

These were not very explicit nor very determinate expressions, but they were amply intelligible to him who heard them.

"To wind up, sir, in short," said Hankes, significantly.

"Yes, Hankes, 'to wind up.'"

"A difficult matter,--a very difficult matter, sir."

"Difficulties have never deterred me from anything, Mr. Hankes. The only real difficulty I acknowledge in life is to choose which of them I will adopt; that done, the rest is matter of mere detail." Mr. Dunn now seated himself at a table, and in the calm and quiet tone with which he treated every business question, he explained to Hankes his views on each of the great interests he was concerned in. Shares in home speculations were to be first exchanged for foreign scrip, and these afterwards sold. Of the vast securities of private individuals pledged for loans, or given as guarantees, only such were to be redeemed as belonged to persons over whom Dunn had no control. Depositary as he was of family secrets, charged with the mysterious knowledge of facts whose publication would bring ruin and disgrace on many, this knowledge was to have its price and its reward; and as he ran his finger down the list of names so compromised, Hankes could mark the savage exultation of his look while he muttered unintelligibly to himself.

Dunn stopped at the name of the Viscount Lackington, and, leaning his head on his hand, said, "Don't let us forget that message to Malta."

"A heavy charge that, sir," said Hankes. "The Ossory has got all his Lordship's titles; and we have set them down, too, for twenty-one thousand seven hundred above their value."

"Do you know who is the Viscount Lackington?" asked Dunn, with a strange significance.

"No, sir."

"Neither do I," said Dunn, hurriedly following him. "Mayhap it may cost some thousands of pounds and some tiresome talk to decide that question; at all events, it will cost you or me nothing."

"The Earl of Glengariff's claim must, I suppose, be satisfied, sir?"

"Of course, it must, and the very first of all! But I am not going to enter minutely into these things now, Hankes. I need a little of that rest you were just recommending me to take. Be here to-morrow at twelve; do not mention my arrival to any one, but come over with the Ossory statement and the two or three other most important returns."

Mr. Hankes rose to withdraw; and as he moved towards the door, his eye caught the oaken box, with three large seals placed by his own hand.