"I know. He's coming to-morrow."
"Yes; so my brother here just told me—an excellent, exemplary, pious prelate, and a true friend to my poor father. He posted fifty miles—from Doncaster—in four hours and a half, to be with him. And a great comfort he was. I shall never forget it to him."
"I don't think you cared for your father, Dives; and Jekyl positively disliked him," interposed Lady Alice agreeably.
"I trust there was no feeling so unchristian and monstrous ever harboured in my brother's breast," replied Dives, loftily, and with a little flush in his cheeks.
"You can't believe any such thing, my dear Dives; and you know you did not care if he was at the bottom of the Red Sea, and I don't wonder."
"Pray don't, Lady Alice. If you think such things, I should prefer not hearing them," murmured Dives, with clerical dignity.
"And what I want to ask you now is this," continued Lady Alice; "you are of course aware that he told the Bishop that he wanted that green chamber, for some reason or another, pulled down?"
Dives coughed, and said—
"Well, yes, I have heard."
"What was his reason, have you any notion?"