meanwhile they are living on charity? And Mr. Melrose, as you say,
may last some years. I saw Mrs. Melrose pass this morning in a carriage.
She looked like a dying woman."

"I have done my best," he said doggedly. "I have argued--and entreated.
To no avail!"

"But you are taking the money"--the quiet intensity of the tone affected
him strangely--"the money, that should be theirs--the money which has
been wrung--partly--from this wretched estate. You are accepting gifts
and benefits from a man you must loathe and despise!"

She was trembling all over. Her eyes avoided his as she sat downcast; her
head bent under the weight of her own words.

There was silence. But a silence that spoke. For what was in truth the
meaning of this interview--of his pleading--and her agonized, reluctant
judgment? No ordinary acquaintance, no ordinary friendship could have
brought it about. Things unspoken, feelings sprung from the flying seeds
of love, falling invisible on yielding soil, and growing up a man knoweth
not how--at once troubled and united them. The fear of separation had
grown, step by step, with the sense of attraction and of yearning. It was
because their hearts reached out to each other that they dreaded so to
find some impassable gulf between them.

He mastered himself with difficulty.

"That is one way of putting it. Now let me put it my way. I am a man who
has had few chances in life--and great ambitions--which I have never had
the smallest means of satisfying. I may be the mere intriguer that Tatham
and his mother evidently think me. But I am inclined to believe in
myself. Most men are. I feel that I have never had my opportunity. What
is this wealth that is offered me, but an opportunity? There never was so
much to be done with wealth--so much sheer _living_ to be got out of it,
as there is to-day. Luxury and self-indulgence are the mere abuse of
wealth. Wealth means everything nowadays that a man is most justified
in desiring!--supposing he has the brains to use it. That at any rate is
my belief. It always has been my belief. Trust me--that is all I ask of
my friends. Give me time. If Mr. Melrose were to die soon--immediately--I
should be able all the quicker to put everything to rights. But if his
death is delayed a year or two--my life indeed will be a dog's life"--he
spoke with sudden emotion--"but the people on the estate will not be the
worse, but the better, for my being there; and in the end the power will