up into the corner among the cushions,
and wrapped her rug round her, for it was bitterly cold. The merchant
pulled a note-book from his pocket and proceeded by the light of the
lamp above him to add up columns of figures. He sat very upright in his
seat, and appeared to be as absorbed in his work as though he were among
his papers in Fenchurch Street. He neither glanced at his companion nor
made any inquiry as to her comfort.

As she sat opposite to him she could not keep her eyes from his hard
angular face, every rugged feature of which was exaggerated by the
flickering yellow light above him. Those deep-set eyes and sunken
cheeks had been familiar to her for years. How was it that they now,
for the first time, struck her as being terrible? Was it that new
expression which had appeared upon them, that hard inexorable set about
the mouth, which gave a more sinister character to his whole face?
As she gazed at him an ineffable loathing and dread rose in her soul,
and she could have shrieked out of pure terror. She put her hand up to
her throat with a gasp to keep down the sudden inclination to cry out.
As she did so her guardian glanced over the top of the note-book with
his piercing light grey eyes.

"Don't get hysterical!" he cried. "You have given us trouble enough
without that."

"Oh, why are you so harsh?" she cried, throwing out her arms towards him
in eloquent entreaty, while the tears coursed down her cheeks.
"What have I done that is so dreadful? I _could_ not love your son, and
I do love another. I am so grieved to have offended you. You used to
be kind and like a father to me."

"And a nice return you have made me! 'Honour your father,' says the
good old Book. What honour did you give me save to disobey every
command which I have ever given you. I have to blame myself to some
extent for having allowed you to go on that most pernicious trip to
Scotland, where you were thrown into the company of this young
adventurer by his scheming old fool of a father."

It would have been a study for a Rembrandt to depict the craggy,
strongly lined face of the old merchant, and the beautiful pleading one
which looked across at him, with the light throwing strange shadows over
both. As he spoke she brushed the tears from her eyes and an angry
flush sprang to her cheeks.

"You may say what you like of me," she said bitterly. "I suppose that
is one of your privileges as my guardian. You have no right, ho