ble,
is lost. He was certain that at the moment of his death Pippin could
have discussed bimetallism, or any intellectual problem, except the one
problem of his own heart; that, for some mysterious reason, had been too
much for him. His death had been the work of a moment of supreme
revolt--a single instant of madness on a single subject! He found on the
blotting-paper, scrawled across the impress of the signature, "Can't
stand it!" The completion of that letter had been to him a struggle
ungraspable by Scorrier. Slavery? Defeat? A violation of Nature? The
death of justice? It were better not to think of it! Pippin could have
told--but he would never speak again. Nature, at whom, unaided, he had
dealt so many blows, had taken her revenge...!

In the night Scorrier stole down, and, with an ashamed face, cut off a
lock of the fine grey hair. 'His daughter might like it!' he thought....

He waited till Pippin was buried, then, with the letter in his pocket,
started for England.

He arrived at Liverpool on a Thursday morning, and travelling to town,
drove straight to the office of the company. The Board were sitting.
Pippin's successor was already being interviewed. He passed out as
Scorrier came in, a middle-aged man with a large, red beard, and a foxy,
compromising face. He also was a Cornishman. Scorrier wished him luck
with a very heavy heart.

As an unsentimental man, who had a proper horror of emotion, whose living
depended on his good sense, to look back on that interview with the Board
was painful. It had excited in him a rage of which he was now heartily
ashamed. Old Jolyon Forsyte, the chairman, was not there for once,
guessing perhaps that the Board's view of this death would be too small
for him; and little Mr. Booker sat in his place. Every one had risen,
shaken hands with Scorrier, and expressed themselves indebted for his
coming. Scorrier placed Pippin's letter on the table, and gravely the
secretary read out to his Board the last words of their superintendent.
When he had finished, a director said, "That's not the letter of a
madman!" Another answered: "Mad as a hatter; nobody but a madman would
have thrown up such a post." Scorrier suddenly withdrew. He heard
Hemmings calling after him. "Aren't you well, Mr. Scorrier? aren't you
well, sir?"

He shouted back: "Quite sane, I thank you...."

The Naples "express" rolled round the outskirts of the town. Vesuvius
shone in the sun, uncro