out it! If I had
done the same thing in my youth, I should have been better off than I am
at present."

Bunny smiled a little. "You would probably have been wishing you'd done
the other thing by this time."

"Much you know about it!" returned Saltash with a whimsical frown. "Now
look here! What I've really come back for is to see you married. All this
preliminary messing about is nothing but a weariness to the flesh. Get it
over, man! There's nothing on earth to wait for. Larpent's willing
enough. In fact, he agrees with me--the sooner the better."

"He would!" said Bunny with a touch of bitterness.

"Well, you can't ask for anything better," maintained Saltash. "He's got
his job, and he's not what you could call a family man. He's not a waster
either, so you needn't put on any damned airs, _mon vieux_."

"I didn't!" said Bunny hotly.

Saltash laughed, and clapped a hand on his shoulder. "Look here! I'm
talking for the good of your soul. Don't take any more advice--certainly
not Sheila Melrose's! You go straight ahead and marry her! You've got
money, I know, but I hope you won't chuck your job on that account. Stick
to it, and you shall have the Dower House to live in while I yet cumber
the ground, and Burchester Castle as soon as I'm under it!"

"What?" said Bunny. He turned almost fiercely. "Charlie! Stop it! You're
talking rot. You always do. I don't want your beastly castle. You've got
to marry and get an heir of your own. I'm damned if I'm going to be
adopted by you!"

Saltash was laughing carelessly, mockingly, yet there was about him at
the moment a certain royal self-assurance that made itself felt. "You'll
do as you're told, _mon ami_. And you'll take what the gods send without
any cavilling. As for me, I go my own way. I shall never marry. I shall
never have an heir of my own blood. Burchester means more to you than it
does to me. Therefore Burchester will pass to you at my death. Think you
and Toby will be happy here?"

"Damn it!" said Bunny, still fiercely disconcerted. "You talk as if you
were going to die to-morrow."

"Oh, probably not," said Saltash airily. "But I doubt if I live to a
rakish old age. I'm a man that likes taking chances, and those who dice
with the high gods are bound to throw a blank some day." For a moment the
mockery died down in his eyes, and he looked more nearly serious than
Bunny had ever seen him. He patted the shoulder under his hand. "Life is
rather a rotten old show