closely, was shocked to see how thin and haggard
was his face. He asked now, "Did you ever think that maybe what Austin
was thinking about when he chucked the money was what you'd say, how
you'd take it? I should imagine," he added with a faint smile,' "that
he is hard to please if he's not pretty well satisfied."

Sylvia was startled. "No. Why no," she said, "I thought I'd looked at
every single side of it, but I never dreamed of that."

"Oh, I don't mean he did it _for_ that! Lord, no! I suppose it's been
in his mind for years. But afterwards, don't you suppose he thought
... he'd been run after for his money such a terrible lot, you know
... don't you suppose he thought he'd be sure of you one way or the
other, about a million times surer than he could have been any other
way; if you stuck by him, don't you see, with old Felix there with all
his fascinations, plus Molly's money." He turned on her with a sudden
confused wonder in his face. "God! What a time he took to do it! I
hadn't realized all his nerve till this minute. He must have known
what it meant, to leave you there with Felix ... to risk losing you as
well as--Any other man would have tried to marry you first and then--!
Well, what a dead-game sport he was! And all for a lot of dirty
Polacks who'd never laid eyes on him!"

He took his riding-cap from his head and tossed it on the dried
pine-needles. Sylvia noticed that his dry, thin hair was already
receding from his parchment-like forehead. There were innumerable fine
lines about his eyes. One eyelid twitched spasmodically at intervals.
He looked ten years older than his age. He looked like a man who would
fall like a rotten tree at the first breath of sickness.

He now faced around to her with a return to everyday matters. "See
here, Sylvia, I've just got it through my head. Are you waiting here
for that five-fifteen train to West Lydford and then are you planning
to walk out to the Austin Farm? Great Scott! don't do that, in this
heat. I'll just run back to the village and get a car and take you
there in half an hour." He rose to his feet, but Sylvia sprang up
quickly, catching at his arm in a panic. "No! no! Arnold, you don't
understand. I haven't written Austin a word--he doesn't know I'm
coming. At first in Paris I couldn't--I was so despicable--and then
afterwards I couldn't either,--though it was all right then. There
aren't any words. It's all too big, too deep to talk about. I didn't
want to,