At the very hour when Mr.Verner was summoning his son to his death-bed, at the precise time that military authority in India would have said, if asked, that Colonel Sir Lionel Verner could _not_ be spared, death had marked out that brave officer for his own especial prey.

He fell in one of the skirmishes that took place near Moultan, and the two letters--one going to Europe with tidings of his death, the other going to India with news of his father's illness--crossed each other on the route.
"Steevy," said old Mr.Verner to his younger son, after giving a passing lament to Sir Lionel, "I shall leave Verner's Pride to you." "Ought it not to go to the lad at Eton, father ?" was the reply of Stephen Verner.
"What's the lad at Eton to me ?" cried the old man.

"I'd not have left it away from Lionel, as he stood first, but it has always seemed to me that you had the most right to it; that to leave it away from you savoured of injustice.

You were at its building, Steevy; it has been your home as much as it has been mine; and I'll never turn you from it for a stranger, let him be whose child he may.

No, no! Verner's Pride shall be yours.