“I can’t tell what you mean,” said Lydgate, “unless it is that I once spoke of you to Mrs. Casaubon. But I did not think that she would break her promise not to mention that I had done so,” said Lydgate, leaning his back against the corner of the mantelpiece, and showing no radiance in his face.

“It was Brooke who let it out, only the other day. He paid me the compliment of saying that he was very glad I had the living though you had come across his tactics, and had praised me up as a Ken and a Tillotson, and that sort of thing, till Mrs. Casaubon would hear of no one else.”

“Oh, Brooke is such a leaky-minded fool,” said Lydgate, contemptuously.