t, but I am a very easy person to understand--it could not have been
very difficult. I imagined, foolishly, that things would be quite
easy--that there would be no complications. I soon found that I had
made a mistake; you have taught me more during the last fortnight than
I had ever learnt in all my twenty years abroad. I have learnt that to
expect affection from your own relations, even from your son, is
absurd--affection is bad form; that, of course, was rather a shock.

"You have had, all of you, your innings during the last fortnight. You
have decided, with your friends, that I am impossible, and from that
moment you have deliberately cut me. You have driven me to find
friends of my own and then you have complained of the friends that I
have chosen. That is completed--in a fortnight you have shown me,
quite plainly, your position. Now I will show you mine. You have
refused to have anything to do with me--for the future the position
shall be reversed. I shall alter in no respect whatever, either my
friendships or my habits. I shall go where I please, do what I please,
see whom I please. We shall, of course, disguise our position from the
world. I have learnt that disguise is a very important part of one's
education. Our former relations from this moment cease entirely."

He was speaking apparently calmly, but his anger was at white-heat.
All the veiled insults and disappointments of the last fortnight rose
before him, but, above all, he saw Mary as though he were defending
her, there, in the room. He would never forgive them.

Clare was surprised, but she did not show it. She got up from the
table and walked to the door. "Very well, Harry," she said, "I think
you will regret it."

Garrett rose too, his hand trembling a little as he folded his
newspaper.

"That is, I suppose, an ultimatum," he said. "It is a piece of
insolence that I shall not forget."

Robin was turning to leave the room. Harry suddenly saw him. He had
forgotten him; he had thought only of Mary.

"Robin," he whispered, stepping towards him. "Robin--you don't think
as they do?"

"I agree with my aunt," he said, and he left the room, closing the door
quietly behind him.

Harry's defiance had left him. For a moment the only thing that he saw
clearly in a world that had suddenly grown dark and cold was his son.
He had forgotten the rest--his sister, Mary, Pendragon--it all seemed
to matter nothing.

He had come from New