to the gathering at Dunholm Castle, which was twelve miles away.  Dunholm was the possession of a man who stood for all that was first and highest in the land, dignity, learning, exalted character, generosity, honour.  He and the late Lord Mount Dunstan had been born in the same year, and had succeeded to their titles almost at the same time.  There had arrived a period when they had ceased to know each other.  All that the one man intrinsically was, the other man was not.  All that the one estate, its castle, its village, its tenantry, represented, was the antipodes of that which the other stood for.  The one possession held its place a silent, and perhaps, unconscious reproach to the other.  Among the guests, forming the large house party which London social news had already recorded in its columns, were great and honourable persons, and interesting ones, men and women who counted as factors in all good and dignified things accomplished.  Even in the present Mount Dunstan’s childhood, people of their world had ceased to cross his father’s threshold.  As one or two of the most noticeable names were mentioned, mentally he recalled this, and Penzance, quick to see the thought in his eyes, changed the subject.

“At Stornham village an unexpected thing has happened,” he said.  “One of the relatives of Lady Anstruthers has suddenly appeared—­a sister.  You may remember that the poor woman was said to be the daughter of some rich American, and it seemed unexplainable that none of her family ever appeared, and things were allowed to go from bad to worse.  As it was understood that there was so much money people were mystified by the condition of things.”

“Anstruthers has had money to squander,” said Mount Dunstan.  “Tenham and he were intimates.  The money he spends is no doubt his wife’s.  As her family deserted her she has no one to defend her.”

“Certainly her family has seemed to neglect her for years.  Perhaps they were disappointed in his position.  Many Americans are extremely ambitious.  These international marriages are often singular things.  Now—­apparently without having been expected—­the sister appears.  Vanderpoel is the name—­Miss Vanderpoel.”

“I crossed the Atlantic with her in the Meridiana,” said Mount Dunstan.

“Indeed!  That is interesting.  You did not, of course, know that she was coming here.”

“I knew nothing of her but that she was a saloon passenger with a suite of staterooms, and I was in the second cabin.  Nothing?  That is not quite true, perhaps.  Stewards and passengers gossip, and one cannot close one’s ears.  Of course one heard constant reiteration of the number of millions her father possessed, and the number of cabins she managed to occupy.  During the confusion and alarm of the collision, we spoke to each other.”

He did not mention the other occasion on which he had seen her.  There seemed, on the whole, no special reason why he should.