'But this secrecy, Leonard, I cannot understand it. Do you mean that
the poor old man durst not do what he would with his own?'

'Just so. Whenever Sam knew that he had a sum of money, he laid hands
on it. Nothing was safe from him that Mr. Axworthy had in the Whitford
Bank.'

'That can be proved from the accounts?'

'You recollect the little parlour between the office and my uncle's
sitting-room? There I used to sit in the evening, and to feel, rather
than hear, the way Sam used to bully the poor old man. Once--a
fortnight ago, just after that talk with Aubrey--I knew he had been
drinking, and watched, and came in upon them when there was no bearing
it any longer. I was sworn at for my pains, and almost kicked out
again; but after that Mr. Axworthy made me sit in the room, as if I
were a protection; and I made up my mind to bear it as long as he
lived.'

'Surely the servants would bear witness to this state of things?'

'I think not. Their rooms are too far off for overhearing, and my
uncle saw as little of them as possible. Mrs. Giles was Sam's nurse,
and cares for him more than any other creature; she would not say a
word against him even if she knew anything; and my uncle would never
have complained. He was fond of Sam to the last, proud of his
steeple-chases and his cleverness, and desperately afraid of him; in a
sort of bondage, entirely past daring to speak.'

'I know,' said Dr. May, remembering how his own Tom had been fettered
and tongue-tied by that same tyrant in boyhood. 'But he spoke to you?'

'No,' said Leonard. 'After that scene much was implied between us, but
nothing mentioned. I cannot even tell whether he trusted me, or only
made me serve as a protector. I believe that row was about this money,
which he had got together in secret, and that Sam suspected, and wanted
to extort; but it was exactly as I said at the inquest, he gave no
reason for sending me up to town with it. He knew that I knew why, and
so said no more than that it was to be private. It was pitiful to see
that man, so fierce and bold as they say he once was, trembling as if
doing something by stealth, and the great hard knotty hands so crumpled
and shaky, that he had to leave all to me. And that they should fancy
I could go and hurt him!' said Leonard, stretching his broad chest and
shoulders in conscious strength.

'Yes, considering who it was, I do not wonder that you feel the
passion-theory as insulting as th