the smooth, brown surface—Hugo Luttrell. And the stolen property was hidden in that little wooden box.

The exclamations of the two brothers were characteristic. Richard raised himself with the pocket-book in his hand, and said vehemently—

"The young scoundrel! He shall rue it!"

While Brian, looking shocked and grieved, sat down on the stump of a tree and muttered, "Poor lad!" between his teeth, as he contemplated the miserable fragments on the ground.

The sound of a bell came faintly to their ears through the clear morning air. Richard spoke sharply.

"We must leave the matter for the present. Don't say anything about it. Lock up the boat-house, Brian, and keep the key. We'll have Hugo down here after breakfast, and see whether he'll make a clean breast of it."

"He may know nothing at all about it," suggested Brian, rising from his seat.

"It is to be hoped so," said Luttrell, curtly. He walked out of the boat-house with frowning brows and sparkling eyes. "I know one thing—my roof won't shelter him any longer if he is guilty." And then he marched away to the house, leaving Brian to lock the door and follow at his ease.

That morning's breakfast was long remembered in the Luttrells' house as a period of vague and curious discomfort. The reddish light in Richard's eyes was well known for a danger signal; a storm was in the air when he wore that expression of suppressed emotion. Brian, a good deal disturbed by what had occurred, scarcely spoke at all; he sat with his eyes fixed on the table, forgetting to eat, and glancing only from time to time at Hugo's young, beautiful, laughing face, as the lad talked gaily to a visitor, or fed the dogs—privileged inmates of the dining-room—with morsels from his own plate. It was impossible to think that this handsome boy, just entering on the world, fresh from a military college, with a commission in the Lancers, should have chosen to rob the very man who had been his benefactor and friend, whose house had sheltered him for the last ten years of his life. What could he have wanted with this money? Luttrell made him a handsome allowance, had paid his bills more than once, provided his outfit, put all the resources of his home at Hugo's disposal, as if he had been a son of the house instead of a penniless dependent—had, in short, behaved to him with a generosity which Brian might have resented had he been of a resentful disposition, seeing that he himself had been much less liberally treated. But Brian never concerned himself about that view of the matter; only now, when he suspected Hugo of dishonesty and ingratitude, did he run over in his mind a list of the benefits which the boy had received for many years from the master of the house, and grow indignant at the enumeration. Was it possible that Hugo could be guilty? He had not been truthful as a schoolboy, Brian remembered; once or twice he had narrowly escaped public disgrace for some dishonourable act—dishonourable in the eyes of his companions, as well as of his masters—a fact which was not to Hugo's credit. Perhaps, however, there was now some mistake—perhaps the matter might be cleared up. Appearances were against him, but Hugo might yet vindicate his integrity——

Brian's meditations were interrupted at this point. His brother had risen from the breakfast-table and was addressing Hugo, with a great show of courtesy, but with the stern light in his eyes which always made those who knew him best be on their guard with Richard Luttrell. "If you are at liberty," he said, "I want you down at the boat-house. I am going there now."

Brian, who was watching his cousin, saw a sudden change in his face. His lips turned white, his eyes moved uneasily in their sockets. It seemed almost as if he glanced backwards and forwards in order to look for a way of escape. But no escape was possible. Richard stood waiting, severe, inflexible, with that ominous gleam in his eyes. Hugo rose and followed like a dog at his master's call. From the moment that Brian marked his sullen, hang-dog expression and drooping head, he gave up his hope of proving Hugo's innocence. He would gladly have absented himself from the interview, but Richard summoned him in a voice that admitted of no delay.

The lad's own face and words betrayed him when he was shown the pocket-book and the broken box. He stammered out excuses, prevaricated, lied; until at last Luttrell lost all patience, and insisted upon a definite reply to his question. And then Hugo muttered his last desperate self-justification—that he had "meant to put it back!"

Richard's stalwart figure, the darkness of his brow, the strong hand in which he was swinging a heavy hunting-crop—caught up, as he left the house, for no decided purpose, but disagreeably significant in Hugo's eyes—became doubly terrible to the lad during the interval of silence that followed his avowal. He glanced supplicatingly at Brian; but Brian had no aid to give him now. And, when Brian's help failed him, Hugo felt that all was lost.

Meanwhile, Brian himself, a little in the back ground, leaned against the trunk of a tree which grew close to the shallow water's edge, bent his eyes upon the ground and tried to see the boy's face as little as possible. His affection for Hugo had given him an influence over the lad which Richard had certainly never possessed. For, generous as Richard might be, he was not fond of his young cousin; and Hugo, being aware of this fact, regarded him with instinctive aversion. In his own fashion he did love Brian—a little bit!

Brian Luttrell was at this time barely three-and-twenty. He had rooms in London, where he was supposed to be reading for the bar, but his tastes were musical and literary, and he had not yet made much progress in his legal studies. He had a handsome, intellectual face of a very refined type, thoughtful dark eyes, a long, brown moustache, and small pointed beard of the same colour. He was slighter, less muscular, than Richard; and the comment often made upon him was that he had the look of a dreamer, perhaps of an artist—not of a very practical man—and that he was extremely unlike his brother. There was, indeed, a touch of unusual and almost morbid sensitiveness in Brian's nature, which, betraying itself, as it did, from time to time, only by a look, a word, a gesture, yet proved his unlikeness to Richard Luttrell more than any dissimilarity of feature could have done.

"You meant to put it back, sir!" thundered Richard, after that moment's pause, which seemed like an eternity to Hugo. "And where did you mean to get the money from? Steal it from some one else? Folly! lies! And for what disgraceful reason did you take it at all? You are in debt, I presume?"

Hugo's white lips signified assent.

"You have been gambling again?"

He bowed his head.

"I thought so. I told you three months ago that I had paid your gambling debts for the last time. I make one exception. I will pay them once again—with the money you have stolen, which you may keep. Much good may it do you!" He flung the pocket-book on the turf at Hugo's feet as he spoke. "Take it. You have paid dearly enough for it, God knows. For the future, sir, manage your own affairs; my house is no longer open to you."

"Don't be hard on him, Richard," said Brian, in a voice too low to reach Hugo's ears. "Forgive him this time; he is only a boy, after all—and a boy with a bad training."

"Will you be so good as to mind your own business, Brian?" said the elder brother, peremptorily. The severity of his tone increased as he addressed himself again to Hugo. "You will leave Netherglen to-day. Your luggage can be sent after you; give your own directions about it. I suppose you will rejoin your regiment? I neither know nor care what you mean to do. If we meet again, we meet as strangers."

"Willingly," said Hugo, lifting his eyes for one instant to his cousin's face, with an expression so full of brooding hatred and defiance that even Richard Luttrell was amazed.

"For Heaven's sake