"I would hear him talk, father."
"The young lord?"
"Yes; the young lord. He is bright and clever, and, coming from another world than our world, can tell me things that I do not know."
"Can he tell thee aught that is good?"
"From what I hear of him from our friend he will tell me, I think, naught that is bad. You will be there to hear, and to arrest his words if they be evil. But I think him to be one from whose mouth no guile or folly will be heard."
"Who art thou, my child, that thou shouldst be able to judge whether words of guile are likely to come from a young man's lips?" But this he said smiling and pressing her hand while he seemed to rebuke her.
"Nay, father; I do not judge. I only say that I think it might be so. They are not surely all false and wicked. But if you wish it otherwise I will not utter another syllable to urge the request."
"We will go, Marion. Thy friend urged that it is not good that thou shouldst always be shut up with me alone. And, though I may distrust the young lord as not knowing him, my confidence in thee is such that I think that nothing will ever shake it." And so it was settled that they should all go. He would send to a livery stable and hire a carriage for this unusual occasion. There should be no need for the young lord to send them home. Though he did not know, as he said, much of the ways of the outside world, it was hardly the custom for the host to supply carriages as well as viands. When he dined, as he did annually, with the elder Mr. Pogson, Mr. Pogson sent him home in no carriage. He would sit at the lord's table, but he would go and come as did other men.
On the Friday named the two ladies and the two men arrived at Hendon Hall in something more than good time. Hampstead hopped and skipped about as though he were delighted as a boy might have been at their coming. It may be possible that there was something of guile even in this, and that he had calculated that he might thus best create quickly that intimacy with the Quaker and his daughter which he felt to be necessary for his full enjoyment of the evening. If the Quaker himself expected much of that gilding of which he had spoken he was certainly disappointed. The garniture of Hendon Hall had always been simple, and now had assumed less even of aristocratic finery than it used to show when prepared for the use of the Marchioness. "I'm glad you've come in time," said he, "because you can get comfortably warm before dinner." Then he fluttered about round Mrs. Roden, paying her attention much rather than Marion Fay,—still with some guile, as knowing that he might thus best prepare for the coming of future good things. "I suppose you found it awfully cold," he said.
"I do not know that we were awed, my lord," said the Quaker. "But the winter has certainly set in with some severity."