“Those five must go,” said Norton.
“No,” replied his lordship, “let the Magdalen stay; it will look like a tendency to repentance, you know, and the old peer may like it.”
“Dunroe, my dear fellow, you know I make no pretence to religion; but I don't relish the tone in which you generally speak of that most respectable old nobleman, your father.”
“Don't you, Tom? Well, but, I say, the idea of a most respectable old nobleman is rather a shabby affair. It's merely the privilege of age, Tom. I hope I shall never live to be termed a most respectable old nobleman. Pshaw, my dear Tom, it is too much. It's a proof that he wants character.”
“I wish, in the mean time, Dunroe, that you and I had as much of that same commodity as the good old peer could spare us.”
“Well, I suppose you do, Tom; I dare say. My sister is coming with him too.”
“Yes; so he says in the letter.”
“Well, I suppose I must endure that also; an aristocratic lecture on the one hand, and the uncouth affections of a hoiden on the other. It's hard enough, though.”
Tom now rang the bell, and in a few moments a servant entered.
“Wilcox,” said Norton, “get Taylor and M'Intyre to assist you in removing those five pictures; place them carefully in the green closet, which you will lock.”