Gerard Maule's sister had gone away with an Irish cousin, and they were now living in India on the professional income of a captain in a foot regiment.

Gerard Maule's younger brother had gone utterly to the dogs, and nobody knew anything about him.
Maule Abbey, the family seat in Herefordshire, was,--so said Mrs.
Atterbury,--absolutely in ruins.

The furniture, as all the world knew, had been sold by the squire's creditors under the sheriff's order ten years ago, and not a chair or a table had been put into the house since that time.

The property, which was small,--L2,000 a year at the outside,--was, no doubt, entailed on the eldest son; and Gerard, fortunately, had a small fortune of his own, independent of his father.

But then he was also a spendthrift,--so said Mrs.
Atterbury,--keeping a stable full of horses, for which he could not afford to pay; and he was, moreover, the most insufferably idle man who ever wandered about the world without any visible occupation for his hours.