y mother, who spent the
money of other people in dissipation and worse than dissipation. Who
came to England and accepted my existence after a leisurely interval as
a matter of course. I have never seen in any one of his actions, or
heard in his tone one single indication of anything save selfishness so
incarnate as to have become the only moving impulse of his life. If
ever I could believe that he cared for me, would find in me anything
save a convenience, I would try to forget the past. If he would even
express his sorrow for it, show himself capable of any emotion
whatsoever in connection with anything or any person save himself, I
would be only too thankful to escape from my ridiculous position."

Then they were silent for a moment, each occupied with their own
thoughts, and Lord Arranmore, pale and spare, taller than most men
there, notwithstanding a recently-acquired stoop, came wearily over to
them.

"Dear me," he remarked, "what gloomy faces--and I expected to see Brooks
at least radiant. Am I intruding?"

"Don't be absurd, Arranmore," she said kindly. "Why don't you bring up
that chair and sit down? You look tired."

He laughed--a little hardly.

"I have been tired so long," he said, "that it has become a habit.
Brooks, will you think me guilty of an impertinence, I wonder? I have
intruded upon your concerns."

Brooks looked up with his eyes full of questioning. "That fellow
Lavilette," Arranmore continued, seemed worried about your anonymous
subscription. I was in an evil temper yesterday afternoon, and Verity
amused me. So I wrote and confounded the fellow by explaining that it
was I who sent the money--the thousand pounds you had."

"You?" Lady Caroom exclaimed, breathlessly.

"You sent me that thousand pounds?" Brooks cried.

They exchanged rapid glances: A spot of colour burned in Lady Caroom's
cheeks. She felt her heart quicken, an unspoken prayer upon her lips.

Brooks, too, was agitated.

"Upon my word," Lord Arranmore remarked, coldly, "I really don't know
why my whim should so much astound you. I took care to explain that I
sent it without the slightest sympathy in the cause--merely out of
compliment to an acquaintance. It was just a whim, nothing more, I can
assure you. I think that I won it at Sandown or something."

"It was not because you were interested in this work, then?" Lady Caroom
asked, fearfully.

"Not in the slightest," he answered. "That is to say, sympathetically
intere