MR AND MRS NEVILL TYSON.

CHAPTER I.

MR NEVILL TYSON.

THERE were only two or three houses in Drayton Parva where Mr and Mrs Nevill Tyson were received. A thrill of guilty expectation used to go through the room when they were announced, and people watched them with a fearful interest, as if they were the actors in some enthralling but forbidden drama.

Perhaps, if she had been tried by a jury of her peers—but Mrs Nevill Tyson had no peers in Drayton Parva. She was tried by an invisible and incorruptible jury of

A

ideas in Miss Batchelor's head. Opinion sways all things in Drayton Parva, and Miss Batchelor swayed opinion.

As for Mr Nevill Tyson, he had dropped into Leicestershire from heaven knows where, and was understood to be more or less on his trial. Nobody knew anything about him, except that he was a nephew of old Tyson of Thorneytoft, and had come in for the property. Nobody cared much for old Tyson of Thorneytoft; he was not exactly—well, no matter, he was very respectable and he was dead, which entitled him to a little consideration. And as Mr Nevill Tyson was an unmarried man in those days he naturally attracted some attention on his own account, as well as for the sake of the very respectable old man his uncle.

He was first seen at a dinner at the Morleys. Somebody else happened to be the guest of the evening, and somebody else took Lady Morley in to dinner. Tyson took Miss Batchelor, and I don't think he quite liked it. Miss Batchelor was cleverfrightfully clever-but she never showed up