ure of you. I didn't know how you'd take it. And I'd
lost my nerve, damn it! the last few years. Thought you might just kick
me out, or set the police on me."

Anderson studied the speaker. His fair skin was deeply flushed; his brow
frowned unconsciously, reflecting the travail of thought behind it.

"What did you say to that gentleman the other night?"

McEwen smiled a shifty smile, and began to pluck some pieces of straw
from his sleeve.

"Don't remember just what I did say. Nothing to do you no harm, anyway.
I might have said you were never an easy chap to get on with. I might
have said that, or I mightn't. Think I did. Don't remember."

The eyes of the two men met for a moment, Anderson's bright and fixed.
He divined perfectly what had been said to the Englishman, Lady Merton's
friend and travelling companion. A father overborne by misfortunes and
poverty, disowned by a prosperous and Pharisaical son--admitting a few
peccadilloes, such as most men forgive, in order to weigh them against
virtues, such as all men hate. Old age and infirmity on the one hand;
mean hardness and cruelty on the other. Was Elizabeth already
contemplating the picture?

And yet--No! unless perhaps under the shelter of darkness, it could
never have been possible for this figure before him to play the part of
innocent misfortune, at all events. Could debauch, could ruin of body
and soul be put more plainly? Could they express themselves more clearly
than through this face and form?

A shudder ran through Anderson, a cry against fate, a sick wondering as
to his own past responsibility, a horror of the future. Then his will
strengthened, and he set himself quietly to see what could be done.

"We can't talk here," he said to his father. "Come back into the house.
There are some rooms vacant. I'll take them for you."

McEwen rose with difficulty, groaning as he put his right foot to the
ground. Anderson then perceived that the right foot and ankle were
wrapped round with a bloodstained rag, and was told that the night
before their owner had stumbled over a jug in Mrs. Ginnell's kitchen,
breaking the jug and inflicting some deep cuts on his own foot and
ankle. McEwen, indeed, could only limp along, with mingled curses and
lamentations, supported by Anderson. In the excitement of his son's
appearance he had forgotten his injury. The pain and annoyance of it
returned upon him now with added sharpness, and Anderson realised that
here was yet