The new year had not opened very auspiciously at Longmead, neither had the Christmas festivities been great.

Dick on his first return home had put on a great appearance of cheerfulness, and had carried himself much as usual; but Mr. Mayne had been glum, decidedly glum, and Mrs. Mayne had found it difficult to adjust the balance of her sympathy between Dick’s voluble quicksilver on the one hand, and her husband’s dead weight of ill humor on the other.

The truth was, Mr. Mayne’s sharp eyes had discerned from the first moment of his son’s entrance into the house that there was no change in his purpose.

To an outsider, Dick’s behavior to his father was as nice as possible. He still kept up his old jokes, rallying him on his matutinal activity, and saying a word about the “early worm,” “so bad for the worm, poor beggar,” observed Dick. And he sauntered after him into the poultry-yard, and had a great deal to say about some Spanish fowls that had been lately imported into Longmead and that were great sources of pride to Mr. Mayne.

Dick paid a great deal of dutiful attention to his father’s hobbies: he put on his thickest boots every day after luncheon, that his father might enjoy the long walks in which he delighted. Dick used to sally forth whistling to his dogs when they went down Sandy Lane; he was careful to pause where the four roads met, that Mr. Mayne might enjoy his favorite view. In all these things Dick’s behavior was perfect. Nevertheless, on their return from one of these walks they each had a secret grievance to pour into Mrs. Mayne’s ear.

Dick’s turn would come first.

“Mother,” he would say, as he lounged into the room where she sat knitting by the firelight and thinking of her boy for just now she was heart and soul on Dick’s side and full of yearning for the sweet girl whom he wanted for his wife, “I don’t know how long this sort of thing is going on, but I don’t think I can put up with it much longer.”

“Have you not had a nice walk with your father?” she asked, anxiously.

“Oh, yes; the walk was well enough. We had some trouble with Vigo, though, for he startled a pheasant in Lord Fitzroy’s preserve, and then he bolted after a hare. I had quite a difficulty in getting him to heel.”

“These walks do your father so much good, Dick.”

“That is what you always say; but I do not think I can stand many more of them. He will talk of everything but the one subject, and that he avoids like poison. I shall have to bring him to book directly, and then there will be no end of a row. It is not the row I mind,” continued Dick, rather ruefully; “but I hate putting him out and seeing him cut up rough. If he would only be sensible and give me my way in this, there is nothing I would not do to please him. You must talk to him; you must indeed, mother.” And then Mrs. Mayne, with a sinking heart, promised that she would do what she could.

And after that it would be her husband’s turn.

“I tell you what Bessie; I am not satisfied about that boy,” he remarked, once, as he came in to warm his hands before going upstairs to dress for dinner. “I don’t know from whom he gets his obstinacy, not from either of us, I am sure of that, but his cheerfulness does not deceive me. He means mischief; I can see that plainly.”

“Oh, Richard! And Dick has been so nice to you ever since he came home. Why, he has not once asked to have any of his friends down to stay. And before this he was never content unless we filled the house. He takes walks with you, and is as domesticated and quiet as possible, so different from other young fellows, who are always racketing about.”

“That is just what bothers me,” returned her husband, crossly. “You have no discernment, Bessie, or you would know what I mean. I should not care a straw if Dick were to cram the house with young fellows: that sort of larking is just natural at his age. Why, he quite pooh-poohed the idea of a dinner-party the other night, though I planned it for his pleasure. His mind is set on other things, and that is why I say he is up to mischief.”

Mrs. Mayne sighed as she smoothed down her satin dress with her plump white hands; but she could not gainsay the truth of this speech: his father was right, Dick’s mind was set on other things.

“I wish you would let him talk to you,” she began, timidly, remembering her promise. “Do, my dear; for I am sure Dick is very much in earnest.”

“So am I very much in earnest,” he returned, wrathfully; and his small eyes grew bright and irritable. “No, it is no use your looking at me in that way, Bessie. I am determined not to allow that boy to ruin his prospects for life. He will thank me one day for being firm; and so will you, though you do turn against your own husband.”

This was too much for Mrs. Mayne’s affectionate nature to bear.

“Oh, Richard, how can you talk so? and I have been a good wife to you all these years!” And here the poor woman began to sob. “You might make allowance for a mother’s feelings; he is my boy as well as yours, and I would cut off my right hand to make him happy; and I do I do think you are very hard upon him about Nan.”

Mr. Mayne stared at her in speechless amazement. Bessie, his long-suffering Bessie, the wife of his bosom, over whom he had a right to tyrannize, even she had turned against him, and had taken his son’s part. “Et tu, Brute!” he could have said, in his bitterness; but his wrath was too great.

“I tell you what,” he said, rising from the seat that was no longer restful to him, and pointing his finger at her, “you and your boy together will be the death of me.”

“Oh, Richard, how can you be so wicked?”

“Oh, I am wicked, am I? That is a nice wifely speech.”

“Yes, you are, when you say such things to me!” she returned, plucking up spirit that amazed herself afterwards. “If you do not know when you have a good wife and son, I am sorry for you. I say again, I think you are making a grievous mistake, Richard. Dick’s heart is set on the girl; and I don’t wonder at it, a dear pretty creature like that. And if you cross him, and set him wrong, you will have to answer to both of us for the consequences.” And then she, too, rose, trembling in every limb, and with her comely face very much flushed. Even a worm will turn, and Bessie Mayne had for once ventured to speak the truth to her husband.

She had the victory that night, for he was too much dumbfounded by her rebellion to indulge in his usual recriminations: he had never imagined before that Bessie owned a will of her own; but he felt now, with a pang of wounded self-love, that the younger Richard had proved a formidable rival.

His wife’s heart relented when she saw his moody looks; but he would not be reconciled to her, in spite of her coaxing speeches.

“Come Richard, come, my dear! you must not be so cross with me,” she said to him later on that night. “We have been married three-and-twenty years, and have never had a serious quarrel; and I don’t like your black looks at me.”

“Then you should not anger me by taking that boy’s part,” was his only answer; and he could not be induced to say anything more conciliatory. And the poor woman went to bed weeping.

Things were in this uncomfortable state, when, one morning, Dick thrust his head into the study where his father was jotting down some household accounts; for he managed all such minor details himself, much to his wife’s relief.

“Are you particularly busy, father? I want to have a talk with you.”

Mr. Mayne looked up quickly, and his bushy eyebrows drew together.

“Well, yes, I am, Dick, most particularly busy just now;” for there was a look on his son’s face that made him feel disinclined for conversation.

“Oh, very well, then; I can leave it until after luncheon,” was the cheerful response; then Mr. Mayne knew that Dick was determined to take the bull by the horns.

They went out after luncheon, taking the dogs with them, and turning their steps in the direction of Sandy Lane. For the first mile, Dick said very little; he had his eye on Vigo, who seemed to be inclined to bolt. But when they had reached the second mile-stone, he cleared his throat; and then Mr. Mayne knew that his trouble was beginning.

“Well, father,” commenced Dick, “I think it is about time we had a little serious talk together about my future plans. Of course I want to know if I am to go down next term.”

“I don’t see that we need discuss that. You will read for your degree, of course.”

Mr. Mayne spoke fast and nervously; but Dick was quite cool, at least, outwardly so.

“There is no ‘of course’ in the matter. I can only read for my degree on one condition.”

“And what is that, may I ask?” with rising choler in his voice.

“That you will have Nan down to Longmead, and that you and my mother sanction our engagement.”

“Never, sir! never!” in a vehement tone.

“Please don’t excite yourself, father. I think it is I who ought to be excited; but, you see, I am quite cool, perfectly so. I am far too much in earnest to be otherwise. When a man’s future prospects are at stake, and his own father seems determined to thwart him, it is time to summon up all one’s energies. I hope you are not serious in what you say, that you do absolutely refuse to sanction my engagement with Nan?”

“There is no engagement. If there were, I do absolutely refuse; nay, more, I am determined actively to oppose it.”

“I am sorry to find you have not changed your mind; for it makes all the difference to me, I assure you. Very well: then I must go in for a City life.”

“Do you threaten me, sir?”

“No, father, I would not be so undutiful; but it is a pity your throwing all that money away on my education if I am not to complete it. If I had taken a good degree, I might have turned out something; but never mind, it can’t be helped now. Then you will be kind enough to write a letter of introduction to Stansfield & Stansfield?”

“No, sir; I will write no such letter!” thundered Mr. Mayne; and Dick put his hands in his pocket and whistled. He felt himself losing patience; but, as he said afterwards, his father was in such an awful rage that it was necessary for one of them to keep cool. So, as soon as he recovered, he said, quite pleasantly,

“Well, if you will not, you will not. We may take a horse to the water, but we can’t make him drink. And the time has not come yet for a son to order his own father, though we are pretty well advanced now.”

“I think we are, Dick.”

“I confess I am rather disappointed at not getting that letter. Mr. Stansfield would have attached some importance to it; but I dare say I shall get on with the old boy without it. I may as well tell you that I shall accept anything he likes to offer me, even if it be only a clerkship at eighty pounds a year. After all, I am not worse off than you were at my age. You began at the bottom of the ladder: so I need not grumble.”

“Do you mean to say,” demanded his father, in a tone of grief, “that you really intend to throw me over, and not only me, but all your advantages, your prospects in life, for the sake of this girl?”

“I think it is you who are throwing me over,” returned his son, candidly. “Put yourself in my place. When you were a young man, father, would you have given up my mother, if my grandfather had wished you to do so?”

“The cases are different, altogether different,” was the angry response. “I never would have married a dressmaker.”

“There are dressmakers and dressmakers: but at least my fiancee is a gentlewoman,” returned his son, hotly.

Dick meant nothing by this speech more than his words implied: he was far too good-natured for an arrière-pensee. But his father chose to consider himself insulted.

“You insolent young fellow!” he exclaimed, fuming. “Do you mean your mother was not as good as Miss Nancy, any day? I never did believe in those Challoners, never, in spite of the mother’s airs. I tell you what, Dick, you are treating me shamefully; after all the money I have wasted on you, to turn round on me in this way and talk about the City. I wash my hands of you, sir. I will have nothing to do with introductions: you may go your way, but you will never see a penny of my money.” And he walked on with a very black look indeed.

“All right,” returned Dick. But he was not quite so cool now. “Thank you for all you have done for me, and for letting me know your future intentions. I am thinking it is a good thing Nan has learned her business, for, as we shall be tolerably poor, it will be handy for her to make her own gowns.”

“Very well, Dick.”

“I shall go up to Mr. Stansfield to-morrow; and the day after I suppose I had better write to the Dean. You may not believe me, father,” and here Dick’s lip quivered for the first time, “but I am awfully sorry to cross you in this way; but my heart is so set on Nan that I could not possibly bring myself to live without her.” But to this Mr. Mayne made no reply, and they walked the remainder of the way in silence.

Mrs. Mayne’s heart grew sick with apprehension when she saw their faces at dinner.

Dick looked decidedly cross. To do him justice, the poor fellow was thoroughly miserable; but his aspect was cheerful compared to that of her husband.

Mr. Mayne would not speak; neither would he eat. And even the footman, who took away the untasted viands, looked at his master with fear and trembling, his countenance was so gloomy.

Dick did not seem to notice his father’s failure of appetite; but Mrs. Mayne was one of those women who are given to fancy that if a man refuse his dinner there is something serious the matter with him. And as the meal proceeded she cast piteous looks at her son, but Dick totally ignored them.

As soon as the servants had handed round the fruit, and had left the room, Mr. Mayne rose from the table, leaving his claret untasted, and shut himself into the library, first banging the door behind him, a sound that made his wife’s heart palpitate.

“Oh, Dick, what was happened to your father?” she asked, turning to her boy for comfort. But Dick was unusually sulky, and refused to answer.

“You had better ask him, mother, if you are anxious to know,” he replied, in a voice he very seldom used to her. “As for me, I am so sick of the whole thing, and feel myself so badly used, that I would rather not open my lips on the subject.”

Then Mrs. Mayne sighed, for she knew Dick had one of his obstinate fits on him, and that there would be no further word spoken by him that night.

Poor woman! She knew it was her duty to go into the library and speak a word of comfort to her husband. It might be that Dick had been contumacious, and had angered his father, and it might be her task to pour in the balm of sympathy. Even if he had been hard on her boy, she must not forget that he was her husband.

But as she opened the door she forgot her doubts in a moment. Mr. Mayne’s face was so pale, despite its blackness, that she was moved to instant pity.

“Oh, Richard, what is it?” she said, hurrying to him, “My dear, you must not take it to heart in this way.” And she took his forehead between her hands and kissed it with the old tenderness she had once felt for him, when they, too, had lived and worked for each other, and there was no Master Dick to plague them and rule over his mother’s heart.

“Bessie, that boy will be the death of me,” he groaned. But, notwithstanding the despondency of these words, the comfort of his wife’s presence was visibly felt, and by and by he suffered her to coax the truth from him.