Ravenshoe. By Henry Kingsley.

A DINNER PARTY AMONG SOME OLD FRIENDS. 239
Lord Saltire gave her his arm, and she came and sat down
among them, with her hands calmly folded before her.
"I was determined to come and see you to-night, my dear,"
she said. "I should break down if I couldn't see some that
I loved. And to-night, -in particular" (she looked earnestly at
Lord Saltire). "Is he come yet?"
"Not yet, dear grandma," said Mary.
"No one is coming besides, I suppose? " asked Lady Ascot.
" No one; we are waiting for him."
The door was opened once more, and they all looked curiously
round. This time the servant announced, perhaps in a somewhat
louder tone than usual, as if he were aware that they were more
interested,
"Mr. Ravenshoe."
A well-dressed, gentlemanly-looking man came into the room,
bearing such a wonderful likeness to Charles Ravenshoe, that Lady
Hainault and General Mainwaring, the only two who had never
seen him before, started, and thought they saw Charles himself.
It was not Charles, though; it was our old friend William,
whilom pad-groom to Charles Ravenshoe, Esquire, now himself
William Ravenshoe, Esquire, of Ravenshoe.
He was the guest of the evening. He would be heir to Ravenshoe himself some day; for they had made up their minds that
Cuthbert would never marry. Ravenshoe, as Cuthbert was managing it now, would be worth ten or twelve-thousand a year, and,
if these new tin lodes came to anything, perhaps twenty. He
had been a stable-helper, said old Lady Hainault, -the companion
of the drunken riots of his foster-brother impostor, and that quiet,
gentlemanly creature Welter. If he entered the house, she left
it. To which young Lady Hainault had replied, that some one
must ask him to dinner in common decency, if it was only for the
sake of that dear Charles, who had been loved by every one who
knew him. That she intended to ask him to dinner, and that, if
her dear mother-in-law objected to meet him, why the remedy
lay with herself. Somebody must introduce him to some sort of
society; and Lord Hainault and herself had made up their minds
to do it, so that further argument on the subject would be wasted
breath. To which the Dowager replied that she really wished,
after all, that Hainault had married that pretty chit of a thing,
Adelaide Summers, as he was thinking of doing; as she, the
Dowager, could not have been treated with greater insolence even
by her, bold as she was. With which Parthian piece of spite she
had departed to Casterton with Miss Hicks, and had so goaded
and snapped at that unfortunate, reduced gentlewoman by the
way, that at last Hicks, as her wont was, had turned upon her
and given her as good as she brought. If the Dowager could