an say to me, and more, I'll
say to a publisher for you. But he'll probably wink at me."

For a moment she was silent. Then she said: "Schofield rather fancies one
publisher."

"Oh? Who's he?" I asked.

She mentioned a name. If I knew anything at all of business she might as
well have offered _The Life of Michael Andriaovsky_ to The Religious
Tract Society at once....

"Hm!... And has Mr. Schofield any other suggestions?" I inquired.

He had. Several. I saw that Schofield's position would have to be defined
before we went any further.

"Hm!" I said again. "Well, I shall have to rely on Schofield for those
five years in which I saw little of Michael; but unless Schofield knows
more of publishing than I do, and can enforce a better contract and a
larger sum on account than I can, I really think, Maschka, that you'll do
better to leave things to me. For one thing, it's only fair to me. My
name hasn't much of an artistic value nowadays, but it has a very
considerable commercial one, and my worth to publishers isn't as a writer
of the Lives of Geniuses."

I could see she didn't like it; but that couldn't be helped. It had to be
so. Then, as we sat for a time in silence over the fire, I noticed again
how like her brother she was. She was not, it was true, much like him as
he had been on that last visit of mine to him ... and I sighed as I
remembered that visit. The dreadful scene had come back to me....

On account, I suppose, of the divergence of our paths, I had not even
heard of his illness until almost the finish. Immediately I had hastened
to the Hampstead "Home," only to find him already in the agony. He had
not been too far gone to recognise me, however, for he had muttered
something brokenly about "knowing better," that a spasm had interrupted.
Besides myself, only Maschka had been there; and I had been thankful for
the summons that had called her for a moment out of the room. I had still
retained his already cold hand; his brow had worked with that dreadful
struggle; and his eyes had been closed.

But suddenly he had opened them, and the next moment had sat up on his
pillow. He had striven to draw his hand from mine.

"Who are you?" he had suddenly demanded, not knowing me.

I had come close to him. "You know me, Andriaovsky--Harrison?" I had
asked sorrowfully.

I had been on the point of repeating my name but suddenly, after holding
my eyes for a moment with a look the profundity and familiarity of whi