about the mending of his personal fortunes--the
grubbing of riches for himself. Well, well! It was good matter wasted on
a paltry cause. But it sorted excellently with what Mr. Caryll knew
of the nature of this father of his. It never could transcend the
practical; there was no imagination to carry it beyond those narrow
sordid confines, and Mr. Caryll had been a fool to have supposed that
any other springs were pushing here. Egotism, egotism, egotism! Its
name, he thought, was surely Ostermore. And again, as once before, under
the like circumstances, he found more pity than scorn awaking in his
heart. The whole wasted, sterile life that lay behind this man; the
unhappy, loveless home that stood about him now in his declining years
were the fruits he had garnered from that consuming love of self with
which the gods had cursed him.

The only ray to illumine the black desert of Ostermore's existence
was the affection of his ward, Hortensia Winthrop, because in that one
instance he had sunk his egotism a little, sparing a crumb of pity--for
once in his life--for the child's orphanhood. Had Ostermore been other
than the man he was, his existence must have proved a burden beyond his
strength. It was so barren of good deeds, so sterile of affection.
Yet encrusted as he was in that egotism of his--like the limpet in
its shell--my lord perceived nothing of this, suffered nothing of it,
understanding nothing. He was all-sufficient to himself. Giving nothing,
he looked for nothing, and sought his happiness--without knowing the
quest vain--in what he had. The fear of losing this had now in his
declining years cast, at length, a shadow upon his existence.

Mr. Caryll looked at him almost sorrowfully. Then he put by his
thoughts, and broke the silence. "All this I had understood when first I
sought you out," said he. "Yet your lordship did not seem to realize it
quite so keenly. Is it that Atterbury and his friends--?"

"No, no," Ostermore broke in. "Look'ee! I will be frank--quite frank and
open with you, Mr. Caryll. Things were bad when first you came to
me. Yet not so bad that I was driven to a choice of evils. I had lost
heavily. But enough remained to bear me through my time, though Rotherby
might have found little enough left after I had gone. While that was so,
I hesitated to take a risk. I am an old man. It had been different had I
been young with ambitions that craved satisfying. I am an old man; and
I desired peace and m