way. Our mother has told you about the will?"

"I'm not down for a half-penny in the will. I expected as much. Go on."

"You are wrong--you _are_ down in it. There is liberal provision made
for you in a codicil. Unhappily, my father died without signing it. It
is needless to say that I consider it binding on me for all that. I am
ready to do for you what your father would have done for you. And I only
ask for one concession in return."

"What may that be?"

"You are living here very unhappily, Geoffrey, with your wife."

"Who says so? I don't, for one."

Julius laid his hand kindly on his brother's arm.

"Don't trifle with such a serious matter as this," he said. "Your
marriage is, in every sense of the word, a misfortune--not only to you
but to your wife. It is impossible that you can live together. I have
come here to ask you to consent to a separation. Do that--and the
provision made for you in the unsigned codicil is yours. What do you
say?"

Geoffrey shook his brother's hand off his arm.

"I say--No!" he answered.

Lady Holchester interfered for the first time.

"Your brother's generous offer deserves a better answer than that," she
said.

"My answer," reiterated Geoffrey, "is--No!"

He sat between them with his clenched fists resting on his
knees--absolutely impenetrable to any thing that either of them could
say.

"In your situation," said Julius, "a refusal is sheer madness. I won't
accept it."

"Do as you like about that. My mind's made up. I won't let my wife be
taken away from me. Here she stays."

The brutal tone in which he had made that reply roused Lady Holchester's
indignation.

"Take care!" she said. "You are not only behaving with the grossest
ingratitude toward your brother--you are forcing a suspicion into your
mother's mind. You have some motive that you are hiding from us."

He turned on his mother with a sudden ferocity which made Julius spring
to his feet. The next instant his eyes were on the ground, and the devil
that possessed him was quiet again.

"Some motive I'm hiding from you?" he repeated, with his head down, and
his utterance thicker than ever. "I'm ready to have my motive posted all
over London, if you like. I'm fond of her."

He looked up as he said the last words. Lady Holchester turned away
her head--recoiling from her own son. So overwhelming was the shock
inflicted on her that even the strongly rooted prejudice which Mrs.
Glenarm had implanted in her min