f her?"

"Why, to tell you the truth, we have to see each other a good deal,
owing to her duties."

"Ah, yes, I understand. She writes to dictation, and that kind of
thing. Strange that Lady Ogram should have engaged such a very
unpleasant young woman. I've seldom known anyone I disliked so much."

"Really? She's of the new school, you know; the result of the
emancipation movement." Dyce smiled, as if indulgently. "Lady Ogram
thinks a great deal of her, and, I fancy, means to leave her money."

"Gracious! You don't say so!"

Mrs. Lashmar put the subject disdainfully aside, and Dyce was glad to
speak of something else.

Throughout the day, the vicar was too busy to hold conversation with
his son. But after dinner they sat alone together in the study, Mrs.
Lashmar being called forth by some parochial duty. As he puffed at his
newly-lighted pipe, Dyce reflected on all that had happened since he
last sat here, some three months ago, and thought of what might have
been his lot had not fortune dealt so kindly with him. Glancing at his
father's face, he noted in it the signs of wearing anxiety; it seemed
to him that the vicar looked much older than in the spring, and he was
impressed by the pathos of age, which has no hopes to nourish, which
can ask no more of life than a quiet ending. He could not imagine
himself grey-headed, disillusioned; the effort to do so gave him a
thrill of horror. Thereupon he felt reproach of conscience. For all the
care and kindness he had received from his father, since the days when
he used to come into this very room to show how well he could read a
page of some child's story, what return had he made? None whatever in
words, and little enough in conduct. All at once, he felt a desire to
prove that he was not the insensible egoist his father perhaps thought
him.

"I'm afraid you're a good deal worried, father," he began, looking at
the paper-covered writing-table.

"I'm putting my affairs in order, Dyce," the vicar replied, running
fingers through his beard. "I've been foolish enough to let them get
very tangled; let me advise you never to do the same. But it'll all be
straight before long. Don't trouble about me; let me hear of your own
projects. I heartily wish it were in my power to help you."

"You did that much longer than I ought to have allowed," returned Dyce.
"I feel myself to a great extent the cause of your troubles--"

"Nothing of the kind," broke in his father, cheerily. "