Lord L'Estrange parted company with Mr. Digby at the entrance of Oxford
Street. The father and child there took a cabriolet. Mr. Digby directed
the driver to go down the Edgware Road. He refused to tell L'Estrange
his address, and this with such evident pain, from the sores of pride,
that L'Estrange could not press the point. Reminding the soldier of his
promise to call, Harley thrust a pocket-book into his hand, and walked
off hastily towards Grosvenor Square.

He reached Audley Egerton's door just as that gentleman was getting out
of his carriage; and the two friends entered the house together.

"Does the nation take a nap to-night?" asked L'Estrange. "Poor old lady!
She hears so much of her affairs, that she may well boast of her
constitution: it must be of iron."

"The House is still sitting," answered Audley, seriously, and with small
heed of his friend's witticism. "But it is not a Government motion, and
the division will be late, so I came home; and if I had not found you
here, I should have gone into the Park to look for you."

"Yes; one always knows where to find me at this hour, nine o'clock P.M.,
cigar, Hyde Park. There is not a man in England so regular in his
habits."

Here the friends reached a drawing-room in which the member of parliament
seldom sat, for his private apartments were all on the ground-floor.

"But it is the strangest whim of yours, Harley," said he.

"What?"