Still this would only serve to protract matters--they 'd bring another
action."

"Of course they would, and Kelson has money!"

"I declare I see no benefit in continuing a hopeless contest."

"Don't be hopeless then, that's the remedy."

Bramleigh made a slight gesture of impatience, and slight as it was,
Sedley observed it.

"You have never treated this case as your father would have done, Mr.
Bramleigh. He had a rare spirit to face a contest. I remember one day
hinting to him that if this claim could be backed by money it would be
a very formidable suit, and his answer was:--'When I strike my flag,
Sedley, the enemy will find the prize was scarcely worth fighting for.'
I knew what he meant was, he 'd have mortgaged the estate to every
shilling of its value, before there arose a question of his title."

"I don't believe it, sir; I tell you to your face I don't believe it,"
cried Bramleigh, passionately. "My father was a man of honor, and never
would have descended to such duplicity."

"My dear sir, I have not come twelve hundred miles to discuss a
question in ethics, nor will I risk myself in a discussion with you.
I repeat, sir, that had your father lived to meet this contention, we
should not have found ourselves where we are to-day. Your father was a
man of considerable capacity, Mr. Bramleigh. He conducted a large and
important house with consummate skill; brought up his family handsomely;
and had he been spared, would have seen every one of them in positions
of honor and consequence."

"To every word in his praise I subscribe heartily and gratefully;" and
there was a tremor in his voice as Bramleigh spoke.

"He has been spared a sad spectacle, I must say," continued Sedley.
"With the exception of your sister who married that Viscount,
ruin--there's only one word for it--ruin has fallen upon you all."

"Will you forgive me if I remind you that you are my lawyer, Mr.
Sedley, not my chaplain nor my confessor?"

"Lawyer without a suit! Why, my dear sir, there will be soon nothing to
litigate. You and all belonging to you were an imposition and a fraud.
There, there! It's nothing to grow angry over; how could you or any of
you suspect your father's legitimacy? You accepted the situation as you
found it, as all of us do. That you regarded Pracontal as a cheat was
no fault of yours,--he says so himself. I have seen him and talked
with him; he was at Kelson's when I called last week, and old Kelson
said,--'My