at your dictation. No letter from her will I answer. Across my
threshold her foot will never pass. Thus, sir, concludes all possible
intercourse between you and myself; what rests is between you and that
gentleman."

Darrell had opened a side-door in speaking the last words--pointed
towards the respectable form of Mr. Gotobed standing tall beside his
tall desk--and, before Jasper could put in a word, the father-in-law was
gone.

With becoming brevity, Mr. Gotobed made Jasper fully aware that not only
all, Mr. Darrell's funded or personal property was entirely at his own
disposal--that not only the large landed estates he had purchased (and
which Jasper had vaguely deemed inherited and in strict entail) were in
the same condition--condition enviable to the proprietor, odious to
the bridegroom of the proprietor's sole daughter; but that even the
fee-simple of the poor Fawley Manor House and lands were vested in
Darrell, encumbered only by the portion of L10,000 which the late Mrs.
Darrell had brought to her husband, and which was settled, at the death
of herself and Darrell, on the children of the marriage.

In the absence of marriage-settlements between Jasper and Matilda, that
sum at Darrell's death was liable to be claimed by Jasper, in right of
his wife, so as to leave no certainty that provision would remain for
the support of his wife and family; and the contingent reversion might,
in the mean time, be so dealt with as to bring eventual poverty on them
all.

"Sir," said the lawyer, "I will be quite frank with you. It is my wish,
acting for Mr. Darrell, so to settle this sum of L10,000 on your wife,
and any children she may bear you, as to place it out of your power to
anticipate or dispose of it, even with Mrs. Hammond's consent. If you
part with that power, not at present a valuable one, you are entitled to
compensation. I am prepared to make that compensation liberal. Perhaps
you would prefer communicating with me through your own solicitor. But
I should tell you, that the terms are more likely to be advantageous to
you in proportion as negotiation is confined to us two. It might, for
instance, be expedient to tell your solicitor that your true name (I beg
you a thousand pardons) is not Hammond. That is a secret which, the more
you can keep it to yourself, the better I think it will be for you. We
have no wish to blab it out."

Jasper, by this time, had somewhat recovered the first shock of
displeasure and