A Gray Eye or So. In Three Volumes—Volume II

CONTENTS


HE was still pondering over the many aspects of the question which, to his mind, needed solution, when he returned to the Castle, to find Lord Fotheringay in a chair by the side of a gaunt old man who, at one period of his life, had probably been tall, but who was now stooped in a remarkable way. The stranger seemed very old, so that beside him Lord Fotheringay looked comparatively youthful. Of this fact no one was better aware than Lord Fotheringay.
Edmund Airey had seen portraits of the new guest, and did not require to be told that he was Julius Anthony Avon, the historian of certain periods.
The first thought that occurred to him when he saw the two men side by side, was that Lord Fotheringay would not appear ridiculous merely as the son-in-law of Mr. Avon. To the casual observer at any rate he might have posed as the son of Mr. Avon.
He himself seemed to be under the impression that he might pass as Mr. Avon’s grandson, for he was extremely sportive in his presence, attitudinizing on his settee in a way that Edmund knew must have been agonizing to his rheumatic joints. Edmund smiled. He felt that he was watching the beginning of a comedy.
He learned that Mr. Avon had yielded to the persuasion of Lady Innisfail and had consented to join his daughter at the Castle for a few days. He was not fond of going into society; but it so happened that Castle Innisfail had been the centre of an Irish conspiracy at the early part of the century, and this fact made the acceptance by him of Lady Innisfail’s invitation a matter of business.
Hearing the nature of the work at which he was engaged, Lord Fotheringay had lost no time in expounding to him, in that airy style which he had at his command, the various mistakes that had been made by several generations of statesmen in dealing with the Irish question. The fundamental error which they had all committed was taking the Irish and their rebellions and conspiracies too seriously.