Mr.Kingdon was ten years older than Susan, and had served in Spain, and had not borne too good a character abroad.

He had been in a hard-drinking cavalry regiment, and had spent all his money, and sold out directly the war was over.

There was very little of all this known down hereabouts, where Mr.Kingdon stood very high, on account of his being Lord Durnsville's brother.

But it was known that he was poor, and that the Durnsville estates were heavily encumbered into the bargain." "Then this gentleman would have been no grand match for Miss Meynell, if--" "If he had married her?
No, my lad; and it might have been the knowledge of his poverty that made Susan and her sister think less of the difference between his station and the girl's.

The two women favoured him, anyhow; and they kept the secret from James Halliday, who was a regular upstraight-and-downright kind of fellow, as proud as any lord in his own way.