"Do I see Mr. Knivett, the avoué?" he asked, substituting for once a French term for an English one, perhaps unconsciously.
"I am Mr. Knivett, sir, attorney-at-law."
In the frank, free way that seemed so especially to characterise him, Anthony Castlemaine put out his hand as to a friend.
"You knew my father well, sir. Will you receive his son for old memories' sake?"
"Your father?" asked Mr. Knivett, questioningly: but nevertheless meeting the hand with his own, and glancing again at the card.
"Basil Castlemaine. He who went away so long ago from Greylands' Rest."
"Bless my heart!" cried Mr. Knivett, snatching off his glasses in his surprise. "Basil Castlemaine! I never thought to hear of him again. Why, it must be--ay--since he left, it mast be hard upon five-and-thirty years."
"About that, I suppose, sir."
"And--is he come back?"
Anthony had again to go over the old story. His father's doings abroad and his father's death, and his father's charge to him to come home and claim his paternal inheritance: he rehearsed it all. Mr. Knivett, who was very considerably past sixty, and had put his spectacles on again, never ceased gazing at the relator, as they sat nearly knee to knee. Not for a moment did any doubt occur to him that the young man was other than he represented himself to be: the face was the face of a Castlemaine, and of a truthful gentleman.