Hugh Ritson returned to the hearth. That haunting mirror caught the
light of his eyes again and showed that he too was smiling. At the same
instant there came from the inner room the dull, dead sound of a deep
sob. It banished the smile and made him pause. He looked at the
reflection of his face--could it be the face of a scoundrel? Was he
playing a base part? No, he was merely asserting his rights; his plain
legal rights--nothing more.

He opened a cupboard in the wall and took down a bunch of keys.
Selecting one key, he stepped up to a cabinet and opened it. In a
compartment were many loose papers. Now to see if by chance there
existed a will already. He glanced at the papers one by one and threw
them aside. When he had finished his inspection he took a hasty turn
about the room. No trace--he had been sure of it!

Again the deep sob came from within. Hugh Ritson walked noiselessly to
the inner door, opened it slightly, bent his head, and listened. He
turned away with an expression of pain, picked up his hat, and went out.

The night was very dark. He strode a few paces down the lonnin and then
back to the porch. Uncovering his head, he let the night wind cool his
hot temples. His breath came audibly and hard. He was turning again
into the house when his eye was arrested by a light near the turning of
the high-road. The light was approaching; he walked toward it, and met
Josiah Bonnithorne. The lawyer was jouncing along toward the house with
a lantern in his hand.

"Didn't you meet the stableman?" said Hugh in an eager whisper.

"No."

"The blockhead must have taken the old pack-horse road on the fell-side.
One would be safe in that fool's stupidity. You have heard what has
happened?"

"I have."

"There is no will already."

"And your father is insensible?"

"Yes."

"Then none shall be made."

There was a pause, in which the darkness itself seemed full of speech.
The lantern cast its light only on an open cart-shed in the lane.

"If your mother is the Grace Ormerod who married Robert Lowther and had
a son by him, then Paul was that son--the heir to Lowther's
conscience-money."

"Bonnithorne," said Hugh Ritson--his voice trembled and broke--"if it is
so, then it is so, and we need do nothing. Remember, he is my father. It
is not within belief that he wants to disinherit his own son for the son
of another man."

Mr. Bonnithorne broke into a half-smothered laugh, and stepped close
into the cobble-h