58
WYLDER'S HJiJVD.
"By-the-bye, Wylder, you know the pictures here who
is the tall man, with the long, pale face, and wild, phos-
phoric eyes? I was always afraid of him; in £■ long
peruke, and dark red velvet coat, facing the hall-door. I
had a horrid dream about him last night."
"That? Oh, I know — that's Lome Brandon. He
was one of our family devils, he was. (All the time he
was talking to me his angry little eyes were following
Lake.) "They say he killed his son, a blackguard, who
was found shot, with his face in the tarn in the park. He
was going to marry the game-keeper's daughter, it was
thought, and he and the old boy, who was for high blood,
and all that, were at logger-heads about it. It was not
proved, only thought likely, but he might have done worse.
I suppose Miss Partridge would have had a precious lot of
babbies; and who knows where the estate would have been
by this time."
"I believe, Charlie," he re-commenced suddenly, " there
is not such an unnatural family on record as ours; is
there? Ha, ha, ha! It's well to be distinguished in any
line. I forget all the other good things he did; but he
ended by shooting himself through the head in his bedroom,
and that was not the worst thing ever he did."
And Wylder laughed again, and began to whistle very
low — not, I fancy, for want of thought, but as a sort of
accompaniment thereto, for he suddenly said —
"And where is he staying?"
"Who? —Lake?"
"Yes."
"I don't know; but I think he mentioned Larkin's
house, didn't he? I'm not quite sure."
"I suppose he thinks I'm made of money. By Jove!
if he wants to borrow any I'll surprise him, the cur; I'll
talk to him; ha, ha, ha!"