Miss Beauchamp was conveyed speedily to her own room; and the excellent colonel exclaimed, "Why, Ashborough, this murder which your cousin has committed, seems to affect Miss Beauchamp more than yourself!"
"I had forgot," replied Lord Ashborough, "that she and her brother were almost brought up with those Delawares in their childhood. As to myself, the matter does not affect me at all, colonel--I always thought that some catastrophe of the kind would take place. The father--who was both at school and at college with me--was always one of those violent, ruthless, unprincipled men, on whose conduct you could never calculate; and as he was generally in scrapes and difficulties, you know, temptation might assail him at any moment. The son seemed, from the little I have ever seen of him, a boy of the same disposition. Heaven knows," he added, with an air of modest candor, "I acted in as liberal a manner as possible toward them! It was only the other day that I accepted a mere trifle, in lieu of an annuity of two thousand a year, which I held, payable on their estates."
"Scamps!" said the colonel, walking toward the window. "One never makes any thing of scamps. When one has any poor relations, and I suppose every one has some--the best way is to cut them at once--one never makes any thing of scamps!"
"Mr. Tims, my lord, waiting in the library," said a servant, entering, just as the colonel concluded his sensible, comprehensive, and charitable observation.
"Not the ghost of the murdered man, I hope!" cried Mr. ----, who had been reading the report of the coroner's inquest.
"No; but the body of his nephew, I suppose," replied Lord Ashborough. "You had better try the billiard-room, gentlemen, as the day is so bad;" and he proceeded to the library, where he was awaited by Mr. Peter Tims, dressed in what the newspapers call a suit of decent mourning, with a countenance made to match, according to the tailor's term.
Lord Ashborough nodded, and Mr. Tims bowed low as they met; and the peer, letting himself sink into an easy chair, began the conversation by saying, "I suppose, Mr. Tims, I must condole with you on your uncle's death?"
"I have much need of condolence on many accounts, my lord," replied the lawyer; "but I have one happiness, which is, that while your lordship is pleased to condole with your humble servant, he has an opportunity of congratulating you."
"Why indeed, things seem to have turned out luckily," replied Lord Ashborough; "but I am not yet half informed of what has occurred--all I know is from a brief account in the newspapers."
"If your lordship is at liberty," said the lawyer, "I will explain the whole;" and he forthwith set to work, and recounted all the principal events which had happened since he last left Lord Ashborough; contriving, however, to take almost as much credit to himself for all that had happened, as if he had cut his uncle's throat himself, on purpose to ruin the family of Sir Sidney Delaware.