things usually are pretty rough on the outgoing man in my experience."

"I suppose they are," Lord Fallowfeild said, rather ruefully, his face
becoming preternaturally solemn.

"Not a doubt of it. The individual may get justice. I hope he does. But
mercy is kept for special occasions--few and far between. One must take
things on the large scale. Then you find they dovetail very neatly,"
Knott continued, with a somewhat sardonic mirthfulness. The simplicity
and perplexity of this handsome, kindly gentleman, amused him hugely.
"But to return to Lord Denier--let alone my skill, that of the whole
medical faculty put together couldn't have saved him."

"Couldn't it, though?" said Lord Fallowfeild.

"That's just the bother with your self-made man. He makes
himself--true. But he spends himself physically in the making. All his
vitality goes in climbing the ladder, and he's none left over by the
time he reaches the top. Lord Denier had worked too hard as a youngster
to make old bones. It's a long journey from the shop in the Strand to
the woolsack you see, and he took sick at two-and-thirty I believe. Oh
yes! early death, or premature decay, is the price most outsiders pay
for a great professional success. Isn't that so, Mr. Ormiston?"

But at this juncture the conversation suffered interruption by the
throwing open of the door and entrance of Madame de Vallorbes.

"Pray let no one move," she said, rather as issuing an order than
preferring a request--for her father, Lord Fallowfeild, all the
gentlemen, had risen on her appearance--save Richard.--Richard, his
blue eyes ablaze, the corners of his mouth a-tremble, his heart going
forth tumultuously to meet her, yet he alone of all present denied the
little obvious act of outward courtesy from man to woman.

"Pinned to his chair, like a specimen beetle to a collector's card,"
John Knott said grimly to himself. "Poor dear lad--and with that face
on him too. I hoped he might have been spared taking fire a little
longer. However, here's the conflagration. No question about that. Now
let's have a look at the lady."

And the lady, it must be conceded, manifested herself under a new and
somewhat agitating aspect, as she swept up the room and into the vacant
place at Richard's right hand with a rush of silken skirts. She
produced a singular effect at once of energy and self-concentration--her
lips thin and unsmiling, an ominous vertical furrow between the spring
of her arched eye