Her mother had wished to accompany
her but she had declared that if she could not go alone she would
not go at all. In that she was right; for whatever favour the young
heir to the family honours might retain for his fair cousin, who
was at any rate a Trefoil, he had none for his uncle's wife. She
was shown into his own sitting-room on the ground floor, and then
he immediately joined her. "I wouldn't have you shown upstairs," he
said, "because I understand from your note that you want to see me
in particular."
"That is so kind of you."
Lord Mistletoe was a young man about thirty, less in stature than
his father or uncle, but with the same handsome inexpressive face.
Almost all men take to some line in life. His father was known as a
manager of estates; his uncle as a whist-player; he was minded to
follow the steps of his grandfather and be a statesman. He was
eaten up by no high ambition but lived in the hope that by
perseverance he might live to become a useful Under Secretary, and
perhaps, ultimately, a Privy Seal. As he was well educated and
laborious, and had no objection to sitting for five hours together
in the House of Commons with nothing to do and sometimes with very
little to hear, it was thought by his friends that he would
succeed. "And what is it I can do?" he said with that affable smile
to which he had already become accustomed as a government
politician.
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