roup at Duddon, welcoming the new man,
believing in him, ready to help him, with the instinctive trust of honest
folk.

And last, but flashing through all the rest, Lydia's eyes--the light in
them--and the tones of her voice--"You'll do it!--you'll do it!--you'll
set it all right!"

He perfectly realized at that moment--before the brain had begun to
refine on the situation--what was asked of him. He was to be Melrose's
tool and accomplice in all that Melrose's tyrannical caprice chose to do
with the lives of human beings; he was to forfeit the respect of good
men; he was to make an enemy of Harry Tatham; and he was to hurt--and
possibly alienate--Lydia.

And the price of it was a million.

He rose rather heavily to his feet, and gathered up his papers--a slim
and comely figure amid the queer medley of the room.

"I must have some time to think about what you have said to me, Mr.
Melrose. You've taken my breath away--you won't be surprised at that."

Melrose smiled grimly.

"Not at all. That's natural! Very well then--we meet to-morrow morning.
Before eleven o'clock the will must be either signed--or cancelled. And
for the present--please!--silence!"

They exchanged good-nights. Melrose looked oddly after the young man, as
the door closed.

"He took it well. I suppose he's been sitting up nights over that
precious memorandum. He was to be the popular hero, and I the 'shocking
example.' Well, he'll get over it. I think--I have--both him--and the
Medusa. And what does the will matter to me? Any one may have the gear,
when I can't have it. But I'll not be dictated to--_this_ side of the
Styx!"

Faversham wandered out once more into the summer night. A little path
along the cliff took him down to the riverside, and he paced beside the
dimly shining water, overhung by the black shadow of the woods. When he
returned to the Tower, just as the light was altering, and the chill of
dawn beginning, a long process of tumultuous reflection had linked the
mood of the preceding evening to the mood of this new day, and of the
days that were to follow. He had determined on his answer to Melrose; and
he was exultantly sure of his power to deal with the future. The scruples
and terrors of the evening were gone. His intelligence rose to his task.

This old man, already ill, liable at any moment to the accidents of age,
and still madly absorbed, to the full extent of his powers and his time,
in the pursuits of connoisseurship--