e, I'd sooner sweep a
crossing than come to you for anything. I know you well enough. You
always meant to do this. You saved your face when my father robbed me
from the grave and left me a pauper--you saved your face by putting me
into the works; but you never meant me to stop there. You only waited
your chance to sack me and keep the lot for yourself. And you've jumped
at this and were glad to hear of this--damned glad, I'll bet!"

Daniel did not answer, but turned his back on his brother, and a minute
or two later was driving away. When he had gone, the panting Raymond
went to his room and flung himself on his bed. Under his cooling anger
again obtruded the old satisfaction--amorphous, vile, not to be
named--that he had felt before. This brought ultimate freedom a step
nearer. If ostracism and punishment were to be his portion, then let him
earn them. If the world--his world--was to turn against him, let the
reversal be for something. Poverty would be a fair price for liberty,
and those who now seemed so ready to hound him out of his present life
and crush his future prospects, should live to see their error. For a
time he felt savagely glad that this had happened. He regretted his
letter to his aunt; he thought of packing his portmanteau on the instant
and vanishing for ever; yet time and reflection abated his dreams. He
began to grow a little alarmed. He even regretted his harsh words to his
brother before the twilight fell.

Then his mind was occupied with Sabina; but Sabina had wounded him to
the quick, for it was clear she and her mother had shamelessly published
the truth. Sabina, then, had courted ruin. She deserved it. He soon
argued that the disaster of the day was Sabina's work, and he dismissed
her with an oath from his thoughts. Then he turned to Miss Ironsyde and
found keen curiosity waken to know what she was thinking and feeling
about him. Did she know that Daniel had dismissed him? Could she have
listened to so grave a determination on Daniel's part and taken no step
to prevent it?

He found himself deeply concerned at being flung out of his brother's
business. The more he weighed all that this must mean and its effect
upon his future, the more overwhelmed he began to be. He had worked very
hard of late and put all his energy and wits into spinning. He was
beginning to understand its infinite possibilities and to see how,
Daniel's trust once won, he might have advanced their common welfare.

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