"I will take my leave, then. By the by, what do you suppose the Hazeldean rental is worth--net?"
"I don't know, nor care. You have no designs upon _that_, too?"
"Well, I like keeping up family connections. Mr. Frank seems a liberal young gentleman."
Before Egerton could answer, the Baron had glided to the door, and, nodding pleasantly, vanished with that nod.
Egerton remained, standing on his solitary hearth. A drear, single man's room it was, from wall to wall, despite its fretted ceilings and official pomp of Bramah escritoires and red boxes. Drear and cheerless--no trace of woman's habitation--no vestige of intruding, happy children. There stood the austere man alone. And then with a deep sigh he muttered, "Thank heaven, not for long--it will not last long."
Repeating those words, he mechanically locked up his papers, and pressed his hand to his heart for an instant, as if a spasm had shot through it.
"So--I must shun all emotion!" said he, shaking his head gently.
In five minutes more, Audley Egerton was in the streets, his mien erect, and his step firm as ever.
"That man is made of bronze," said a leader of the Opposition to a friend as they rode past the minister. "What would I give for his nerves!"
From Mr. Kimball's forthcoming "Sequel to St. Leger."
"Dr. Lindhorst has been an intimate friend of my father from the time they were both together at Heidelberg. The Doctor was born in Switzerland, and, after finishing the study of medicine, came back to his native town to practise it. Before this, however, he had become enthusiastically devoted to geology and its kindred sciences, botany and mineralogy; and, indeed, to all those pursuits which have direct relation to nature and her operations. His father dying soon after, and leaving him a handsome patrimony, he had abundant opportunity to indulge in them; which he did, without, however, neglecting his profession. Indeed, he soon acquired a reputation for being skilful and attentive, while every one spoke in terms of commendation of the young Doctor Paul. Suddenly there was a change. He declined any longer to visit the sick, excepting only the most poor and miserable. He absented himself for days and weeks in the mountains, pursuing his favorite objects with an unnatural enthusiasm. Then he left Thun for foreign countries, and was gone two or three years, and returned with an accumulation of various specimens in almost every department of natural science: with note-books, herbariums, cabinets, strange animals stuffed to resemble life, birds, fishes, petrifactions--in short, the air, the water, and the earth had furnished their quota to satisfy his feverish zeal for acquisition. He was still a young man, scarce five-and-twenty, yet he bore the appearance of a person at least forty years old--"