"'"The person you knew as Mr. Antony Belmore is Duke of Fenwick, with a rent-roll of ninety thousand a year!"'"
Here Cheyne finished reading, and throwing down the proofs, said:
"Well, May, what do you think of it?"
"Oh, I think it very clever indeed, only--only----"
"Yes, my ungrateful and critical sweetheart?"
"Only--only--doesn't everyone know who the heir to a dukedom is, like the heir to a kingdom?"
"No; everyone knows nothing."
"But doesn't the Duke himself know who his heir is? Or doesn't the House of Commons, or someone?"
"Dukes know absolutely nothing at all, and the House of Commons knows less."
While Charles Cheyne was reading chapter fifty-two in the little conservatory to his darling sprightly May, the Duke of Shropshire, having voted against the detested Radicals, was returning by express train to Silverview Castle, and Edward Graham was seated in front of the Beagle Inn, Anerly, painting the peaceful valley with Anerly Church in the near middle distance.