come around to your views in the long run, old fellow. In this matter of a lawn shaded by trees, I've come round so completely that I've got to have it, though I'm afraid I can't have it to walk straight out of the house onto, and to look at from my windows. But there's that four-acre field—Barton's Close—down by the wood. I want to bring that in—I suppose you'll have no objection. By thinning out a bit, so as to leave some of the bigger trees isolated, and planting judiciously, I can get the effect there."

"Rather a pity to cut up old pasture, isn't it? And it must be half a mile from the house."

"Oh, nothing like as much as that—not more than five hundred yards, I should say. I wish it were nearer; but it will be effective to lead down to it by a path through the corner of the wood. You'll come upon a charming, restful, retired place that you hadn't been expecting. I only wish the lake had been closer, so as to have brought that in; but I think we could get a vista by cutting down a few trees. I might ask you to consider that later on; but we'd better see how the lawn turns out first."

"I don't think I should want to cut down trees there, William. Whatever distance Barton's Close may be from the Grange, the lake is certainly over a mile. You can't turn the whole place into a garden. As it is, it's overweighted. You've got to consider the future. It would have been all right if poor Hugo had lived. He'd have succeeded me here, and I suppose Norman would have gone on living at the Grange after you."

"Oh, I know, old fellow, but—"

"Let me finish. When I die, and you or Norman come here, Cynthia and the girls will have to live at the Grange. It's much too big a place for them already. I dare say you'd get a big rent for it; but that's not what they'll want. They would have had enough to live on there as it used to be; but with the way things are going now it'll be a place that will want a lot of keeping up. It will want a good deal more keeping up than this."

"Of course you're right to think about the future, old fellow." Sir William spoke more slowly, leaning forward in his chair with his elbows on his knees and tapping his stick on the turf. "I've thought about it a good deal, too. Things are altered now—unfortunately. I come into it more, don't I?—I and Norman."

"Oh, yes, of course. Still, I'm not an old man yet. And Cynthia.... It's not out of the question.... But we needn't think of that. The chances are you'll succeed me. But for a good many years yet—in the ordinary way—I shall be here at Hayslope, and—"

He did not finish, and Sir William did not help him out. He frowned a little as he sat looking down on the grass and tapping his stick, but there was no alteration in the kindly tone of his speech when he said after a time: "If Cynthia bears you another son, nobody will be more pleased than I shall. Some people might think I didn't mean that, but you know better. That's why we can talk over the future between us without misunderstanding one another."

Colonel Eldridge stirred in his seat. "Oh, yes, Bill," he said. "You don't want to step into my shoes yet a while. I know that well enough. You will step into them sooner or later. I know that, too. We shan't have any more children. And as for what's to come after us, Norman will make a better squire of Hayslope than poor Hugo could have done. I wouldn't say so to Cynthia—I don't know that I'd say it to anybody but you—but I've come to see that the poor fellow had made too much of a mess of things for us to have hoped that he'd ever pull up. I feel no bitterness against him—God knows. I did; but that's all wiped out. I loved him when he was a little fellow, and I never really left off loving him, though he brought me a lot of trouble. Now I'm free to love his memory. He did well at the end."

"Oh, yes. You can be proud of him. There was lots of good in him, and it came out at the last. No need to think about all the rest. I haven't thought about it for a long time."

"Well, I've got to think of it occasionally, I'm afraid. Things are still difficult because of poor Hugo. But—"

"Look here, old fellow—why don't you let me wipe all that off? I can do it without bothering myself in the least."

"Thanks, Bill, you're very good. But I'll bear my own burdens."

"Between you and me—what is there to quibble about? I've been lucky in life. But you're a better man than I am, when all's said and done. And you're the head of the family. We ought to stand together—'specially now, when I'm almost in the same position towards you as Hugo was, you might say. Take it as done for Hayslope. In a way, I'm as much interested in the place as you are."

"Thanks, William, but this is a personal matter. Most of my income comes from the place, but I'm only tenant for life. I've got to make good on my own account. It means a bit of skimping, but that's all. There's enough for me and Cynthia and the girls, and I'll hand over Hayslope to you, or whoever it may be, as I received it from our father."

"Well, I won't press you. But you know at any time that the money's there if you want it, and you'll give me pleasure if you'll take it. What's money between you and me? I've been in the way of making it and you haven't. There you have it in a nutshell. But after all, I'm not a money-grubber. I only care for it for what it will bring. It's at your service any time, Edmund—five thousand, ten thousand—whatever you want to clear off that old trouble. Take it from me, that you'll be doing me a real pleasure if you'll ask for it at any time. Are you coming over to tea? I promised Eleanor I'd get back. I think there'll be some people from the Castle."

He rose from his seat. Colonel Eldridge retained his. "I don't think I'll come, thanks," he said, with a slight frown. "I don't particularly care about meeting people from the Castle."

Sir William looked away. There was a slight frown on his face now, but not of annoyance. "I know it's rather difficult for you," he said. "But wouldn't it be better to face it? You must meet them sooner or later. And as far as they are concerned, it's all over. There'd be no real awkwardness. As a matter of fact I don't think that the Crowboroughs are coming themselves. It's the Branchleys—who are staying with them. If they do come, there'd be more or less of a crowd—with all the young people. You'd get over the first meeting, and then it would all be buried."

"I know I've got to meet them some time or other. I know that Crowborough did have cause for complaint against Hugo. But he went much too far, and I can never forget it, now the poor boy's dead."

"You couldn't have forgotten it if he hadn't taken back the worst of what he accused Hugo of. I admit that. But he did take it back, didn't he?"

"Well, did he? That's what I'm not so sure about. I've got to behave as if he did—I know that. If we were to have it out together again, there's likely to be such a row that we should be enemies for life. I don't want that, for the sake of Cynthia and the girls. I suppose he doesn't want it, either, or he wouldn't have tried to mend the row we did have."

"But, surely—"

"I know what you're going to say. He wrote and said he'd never intended to accuse Hugo of swindling young Horsham. It was the way I'd taken what he did say that made him lose his temper and go farther than he'd meant to. That's all very well. But he didn't withdraw the charge."

There was a look of perplexity on Sir William's face as he stood by his brother, preparing to leave him, but not to leave the discussion into which they had so lightly drifted with a ragged edge of