n
name." Bernard spoke thoughtfully. "You said he was no relation."

"I said to the best of my belief he was not." Everard turned suddenly
and sat down. "People are not keen, you know, on owning to shady
relations. He was no exception to the rule. But if the woman died, it's
of no great consequence now to any one. When did she die?"

Bernard took a long pull at his pipe. His brows were slightly drawn.
"She died suddenly, poor soul. Did I never tell you? It must have been
immediately after I wrote that letter to you. It was. I remember now. It
was the very day after.... She died on the twenty-first of March--the
first day of spring. Poor girl! She had so longed for the spring. Her
time would have been up in May."

Something in the silence that followed his words made him turn his head
to look at his brother. Everard was sitting perfectly rigid in his chair
staring at the ground between his feet as if he saw a serpent writhing
there. But before another word could be spoken, he got up abruptly, with
a gesture as of shaking off the loathsome thing, and went to the window.
He flung it wide, and stood in the opening, breathing hard as a man
half-suffocated.

"Anything wrong, old chap?" questioned Bernard.

He answered him without turning. "No; it's only my infernal head. I
think I'll turn in directly. It's a fiendish night."

The rain was falling in torrents, and a long roll of thunder sounded
from afar. The clatter of the great drops on the roof of the verandah
filled the room, making all further conversation impossible. It was like
a tattoo of devils.

"A damn' pleasant country this!" murmured the man in the chair.

The man at the window said no word. He was gasping a little, his face to
the howling night.

For a space Bernard lay and watched him. Then at last, somewhat
ponderously he arose.

Everard could not have heard his approach, but he was aware of it before
he reached him. He turned swiftly round, pulling the window closed
behind him.

They stood facing each other, and there was something tense in the
atmosphere, something that was oddly suggestive of mental conflict. The
devils' tattoo on the roof had sunk to a mere undersong, a fitting
accompaniment as it were to the electricity in the room.

Bernard spoke at length, slowly, deliberately, but not unkindly. "Why
should you take the trouble to--fence with me?" he said. "Is it worth
it, do you think?"

Everard's face was set and grey like a stone mask