e
worked for him, and now he's gone, never will I lift my voice in song
again!"

Edwin could not reply.

"I know what it is," said Big James, after a pause.

"What what is?"

"This ce-re-bral softening. You'll have trouble, Mr Edwin."

"The doctor says not."

"You'll have trouble, if you'll excuse me saying so. But it's a good
thing he's got you. It's a good thing for Miss Maggie as she isn't
alone with him. It's a providence, Mr Edwin, as you're not a married
man."

"I very nearly was married once!" Edwin cried, with a sudden
uncontrollable outburst of feeling which staggered while it satisfied
him. Why should he make such a confidence to Big James? Between his
pleasure in the relief, and his extreme astonishment at the confession,
he felt as it were lost and desperate, as if he did not care what might
occur.

"Were you now!" Big James commented, with an ever intensified
blandness. "Well, sir, I thank you."

VOLUME THREE, CHAPTER FOUR.

THE VICTIM OF SYMPATHY.

On the same evening, Edwin, Albert Benbow, and Darius were smoking
Albert's cigarettes in the dining-room. Edwin sat at the end of a
disordered supper-table, Albert was standing, hat in hand, near the
sideboard, and Darius leaned against the mantelpiece. Nobody could have
supposed from his appearance that a doctor had responsibly prophesied
this man's death within two years. Except for a shade of sadness upon
his face, he looked the same as he had looked for a decade. Though
regarded by his children as an old man, he was not old, being in fact
still under sixty. His grey hair was sparse; his spectacles were set
upon his nose with the negligence characteristic of age; but the
down-pointing moustache, which, abetted by his irregular teeth, gave him
that curious facial resemblance to a seal, showed great force, and the
whole of his stiff and sturdy frame showed force. His voice, if not his
mouth, had largely recovered from the weakness of the morning.
Moreover, the fashion in which he smoked a cigarette had somehow the
effect of rejuvenating him. It was Albert who had induced him to smoke
cigarettes occasionally. He was not an habitual smoker, consuming
perhaps half an ounce a week of pipe-tobacco: and assuredly he would
never of his own accord have tried a cigarette. For Darius cigarettes
were aristocratic and finicking; they were an affectation. He smoked a
cigarette with the self-consciousness which usually marks the
consu