ly,
looking at her and then away again, "your father never had a very
strong head, he--you know--he--"

"Has taken to drink?" Julia asked baldly. "As well as gambling he
drinks now?"

"Oh, no," Johnny said quickly, "not exactly, that is--he does take
more than he used, more than is good for him sometimes; not much is
good for him, you know--he does take more, it is no good pretending he
does not. But it was very dull for him; it did not suit him being
here, I think; he used to get so low in spirits, what with his losses
and feeling he was not wanted at home. He thinks a great deal of your
mother, and he could not but feel that she does not think much of him
to send him away like that; it hurt him, although, as he said to me
more than once, no doubt he deserved it. It preyed on his mind; he
seemed to want something to cheer him."

Julia nodded; she could understand the effect well enough, though the
causes at work might not be quite clear. To her young judgment it
seemed a little strange that her father should have never realised
what a cumberer of the ground he was to his wife until she banished
him "for his health." But so it evidently was, and after all she could
believe it; like some others he had "made such a sinner of his
conscience," that he could believe, not only his own lie, but the
legends woven about him. They had all pretended things, he and they
also; his position, too, had come gradually, he had got to accept it
without thinking before it was an established fact. But now the truth
had been brought home to him--more or less--and he was miserable, and,
according to the custom of his sort, set to making bad worse as soon
as ever he discovered it.

"Why did he go home last week?" she aroused herself to ask.

"He thought it his duty," was Johnny's surprising answer. "No, Mrs.
Polkington did not send for him, she did not know he was coming; he
decided for himself, he felt it would be better."

Mr. Gillat rambled on vaguely, but Julia was not slow to guess that
the principal reason was to be found in the state of Johnny's
finances. She questioned him as to when he had moved into the back
room, and, finding it to be not long before her father's departure,
guessed that discomfort, like the husks of the prodigal son, had
awakened the thing dignified by the name of duty.

For a little she sat in silence, thinking matters over. Johnny smoked
hard at the stump of his cigar, mended the fire and fidgeted, lookin