volume of the Wesleyan Magazine. And he was asleep over the same entertaining work when Lord Arden came the next afternoon.
You will be able to guess what he came about. And Dickie had a sort of feeling that perhaps Lord Arden might have seen by his face, as old Beale had, that he was an Arden. So neither he nor you will be much surprised. The person to be really surprised was Mr. Beale.
"You might a-knocked me down with a pickaxe," said Beale later, "so help me three men and a boy you might. It's a rum go. My lord 'e says there's some woman been writing letters to 'im this long time saying she'd got 'old of 'is long-lost nephew or cousin or something, and a-wanting to get money out of him—though what for, goodness knows. An' 'e says you're a Arden by rights, you nipper you, an' 'e wants to take you and bring you up along of his kids—so there's an end of you and me, Dickie, old boy. I didn't understand more than 'arf of wot 'e was saying. But I tumbled to that much. It's all up with you and me and Amelia and the dogs and the little 'ome. You're a-goin' to be a gentleman, you are—an' I'll have to take to the road by meself and be a poor beast of a cadger again. That's what it'll come to, I know."
"Don't you put yourself about," said Dickie calmly. "I ain't a-goin' to leave yer. Didn't Lady Talbot ask me to be her boy and didn't I cut straight back to you? I'll play along o' them kids if Lord Arden'll let me. But I ain't a-goin' to leave you, not yet I ain't. So don't you go
