Where the haters meet
In the crowded city’s horrible street.—Browning.
Pina was right in her surmises as to the manner of little Lenny’s abduction. And he really had been carried off by one of the two men whom she had detected in watching him.
And this necessitates the explanation of some circumstances, which, however, did not become known until some time afterward.
It not unfrequently happens that the heirs of an estate, or a title long held in abeyance and supposed to be extinct, are poor and obscure people, quite ignorant of their connection with, or right in such an inheritance.
The claim recently confirmed by the House of Lords is a case in point. The claim to the barony of Killcrichtoun is another.
Alexander Lyon was totally uninformed as to his right to the title and estate of Killcrichtoun until his visit to England and Scotland, when, in searching the records of his mother’s family, he discovered the facts that led to his subsequent action in claiming the barony.
But the investigations that ensued developed other facts, and brought forward other heirs, or rather one other, who would surely have been the heir had Alexander been out of existence.
This was a descendant of a younger sister of that ancestress through whom Alexander Lyon claimed the title.
The name of this man was Clarence Everage. He was that most to be pitied of all human creatures—a poor gentleman, with more children than means to support them; more mouths to feed than money to find food; more intellect than integrity; more refinement than firmness. A man now about thirty-five years of age, with a long, hopeless life before him; a man with some beauty of person, dignity of presence, and graciousness of manner; with sensitive feelings, and delicate tastes, and soft white hands; a man who loved fragrant baths and fresh linen every day; and cool, clean, quiet rooms to live in; and well-dressed, soft-speaking light-stepping people about him; and respect and attention and observance from all who came in contact with him; one who loving to be happy and comfortable himself, loved still more to make others happy and comfortable; one naturally more prone to confer favors than to ask them; more willing to give than to take; naturally rather vain than proud, sensitive than irritable, and weak than wicked.