His position was hard: he was doing what honestly seemed to
him the right thing to do: he could not seem to do it because it was
right. He would be wronging the Ivers if he did not do it, yet how ugly
it could be made to look! He was not above suspicion even to himself,
though he clung eagerly to his plea of honesty.

"You fail to put yourself in my place----" he began.

"Absolutely, I assure you," Harry interrupted, with quiet insolence.

"And I can't put myself in yours, sir. But I can tell you what I mean to
do. It is my most earnest wish to take no steps in this matter at all;
but that rests with you, not with me. At least I desire to take none
during Lady Tristram's illness, or during her life should she unhappily
not recover."

"My mother will not recover," said Harry. "It's a matter of a few weeks
at most."

Duplay nodded. "At least wait till then," he urged. "Do nothing more in
regard to the matter we have spoken of while your mother lives." He
spoke with genuine feeling. Harry Tristram marked it and took account of
it. It was a point in the game to him.

"In turn I'll tell you what I mean to do," he said. "I mean to proceed
exactly as if you had never come to Merrion Lodge, had never got your
proofs from God knows where, and had never given me the pleasure of this
very peculiar interview. My mother would ask no consideration from you,
and I ask none for her any more than for myself. To be plain for the
last time, sir, you're making a fool of yourself at the best, and at the
worst a blackguard into the bargain." He paused and broke into a laugh.
"Well, then, where are the proofs? Show them me. Or send them down to
Blent. Or I'll come up to Merrion. We'll have a look at them--for your
sake, not for mine."

"I may have spoken inexactly, Mr Tristram. I know the facts; I could
get, but have not yet got, the proof of them."

"Then don't waste your money, Major Duplay." He waited an instant before
he gave a deeper thrust. "Or Iver's--because I don't think your purse is
long enough to furnish the resources of war. You'd get the money from
him? I'm beginning to wonder more and more at the views people contrive
to take of their own actions."

Harry had fought his fight well, but now perhaps he went wrong, even as
he had gone wrong with Mina Zabriska at Fairholme. He was not content to
defeat or repel; he must triumph, he must taunt. The insolence of his
speech and air drove Duplay to fury. If it told him he was