to
contrive some intimate talk forthwith with the Duke. The young man
seemed both clever and sensible, and in a way impressionable as well.
Thorpe thought that he would probably have some interesting things to
say, but still more he thought of him as a likely listener. It would be
the easier to detach him from the company, since the occasion was one
of studied informality. The Duke did not go about in society, in the
ordinary sense of the word, and he would not have come to High Thorpe to
meet a large party. He was here as a kinsman and friend of his hostess
for a quiet week; and the few other guests fitted readily enough into
the picture of a family gathering. The spirit of domesticity had indeed
so obviously descended upon the little group in the drawing-room, an
hour or so after dinner, that Thorpe felt it quite the natural thing to
put his arm through that of the Duke and lead him off to his personal
smoking-room. He even published his intention by audibly bidding the
Hon. Balder Plowden to remain with the ladies.

When the two had seated themselves in soft, low easy-chairs, and the
host had noted with pleasure that his guest had no effeminate qualms in
the matter of large rich cigars, a brief silence ensued.

"I am very anxious to get your views on a certain subject," Thorpe was
inspired to begin, bluntly pushing preliminaries aside. "If a man of
fortune wishes to do genuine good with his money, here in England, how
should he best go about it?"

The Duke looked up at his questioner, with a sudden flash of surprise on
his dark, mobile face. He hesitated a moment, and smiled a little. "You
ask of me the sum of human wisdom," he said. "It is the hardest of all
problems; no one solves it."

Thorpe nodded his big head comprehendingly. "That's all the more reason
why it ought to be solved," he declared, with slow emphasis.

The other expressed by look and tone an augmented consciousness of the
unexpected. "I did not know," he remarked cautiously, "that this was a
matter in which you were specially concerned. It pleases me very much to
hear it. Even if the solution does not come, it is well to have as many
as possible turning the problem over in their minds."

"Oh, but I'm going to solve it!" Thorpe told him, with round confidence.

The Duke pulled contemplatively at his cigar for a little. "Do not think
me a cynic," he began at last. "You are a man of affairs; you have made
your own way; you should be even more f