fit, Mr.
Melrose, and the business management of your property have been my sole
concern."

"I am sure that you think so. But as to what is profit and what is
business, you must allow me to be the final judge."

Faversham thought a moment, then rose, and walked quietly up and down the
length of the room, his hands in his pockets. The old man watched him,
his haughty look and regular features illuminated by the lamp beside him.
In front of him was the famous French table, crowded as usual with a
multitude of miscellaneous _objets d'art_, conspicuous among them a pair
of Tanagra figures, white visions of pure grace, amid the dusty confusion
of their surroundings.

Suddenly Melrose flung his cigarette vehemently away.

"Faversham! Don't be a fool! I have something to say to you a deal more
important than this damned nonsense!" He struck his hand on the open
memorandum.

Faversham turned in astonishment.

"Sit down again!" said Melrose peremptorily, "and listen to me. I desire
to put things as plainly and simply as possible. But I must have all your
attention."

Faversham sat down. Melrose was now standing, his hands on the back of
the chair from which he had risen.

"I have just made my will," he said abruptly. "Tomorrow I hope to sign
it. It depends on you whether I sign it or not."

As the speaker paused, Faversham, leaning back and fronting him, grew
visibly rigid. An intense and startled expectancy dawned in his face; his
lips parted.

"My will," Melrose continued, in a deliberately even voice, "concerns a
fortune of rather more--than a million sterling--allowing little or
nothing for the contents of this house. I inherited a great deal, and by
the methods I have adopted--not the methods, my dear Faversham, I may
say, that you have been recommending to me to-night. I have more than
doubled it. I have given nothing away to worthless people, and no sloppy
philanthropies have stood between me and the advantages to which my
knowledge and my brains entitled me. Hence these accumulations. Now, the
question is, what is to be done with them? I am alone in the world. I
have no interest whatever in building universities, or providing free
libraries, or subsidizing hospitals. I didn't make the world, and I have
never seen why I should spend my energies in trying to mend what the
Demiurge has made a mess of. In my view the object of everybody should be
to _live_, as acutely as possible--to get as many sensations, as m