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"What do you mean by that?"

"Why, that we shall be so infatuated with you that we shall make your life a burden to you. You'll see soon enough what I mean by it."

"Possibly," the old man said; "to understand you I shall have to. You speak of something that as yet—with my race practically run—I know nothing about. I was no success as a young man. I mean of the sort that would have made most difference. People wouldn't look at me—"

"Well, WE shall look at you," Vanderbank declared. Then he added: "What people do you mean?" And before his friend could reply: "Lady Julia?"

Mr. Longdon's assent was mute. "Ah she was not the worst! I mean that what made it so bad," he continued, "was that they all really liked me. Your mother, I think—as to THAT, the dreadful consolatory 'liking'— even more than the others."

"My mother?"—Vanderbank was surprised. "You mean there was a question—?"

"Oh for but half a minute! It didn't take her long. It was five years after your father's death."

This explanation was very delicately made. "She COULD marry again."