though she owed him a good
deal more than patience. For at the time, some twenty years before, when
she had married Robert Pettifer, then merely a junior partner of the
firm, Harold Hazlewood had alone stood by her. To the rest of the family
she was throwing herself away; to her brother Harold she was doing a fine
thing, not because it was a fine thing but because it was an exceptional
thing. Robert Pettifer however had prospered, and though he had reached
an age when he might have claimed his leisure the nine o'clock train
still took him daily to London.

"Aunt Margaret isn't after all so violent," said Dick, for whom she kept
a very soft place in her heart. But Harold shook his head.

"Your aunt, Richard, has all the primeval ferocity of the average woman."
And then the fires of the enthusiast were set alight in his blue eyes.
"I'll tell you what I'll do: I'll send her my new pamphlet, Richard. It
may have a humanising influence upon her. I have some advance copies.
I'll send her one this afternoon."

Dick's eyes twinkled.

"I should if I were you, though to be sure, sir, we have tried that plan
before without any prodigious effect."

"True, Richard, true, but I have never before risen to such heights as
these." Mr. Hazlewood threw down his napkin and paced the room. "Richard,
I am not inclined to boast. I am a humble man."

"It is only humility, sir, which achieves great work," said Dick, as he
went contentedly on with his luncheon.

"But the very title of this pamphlet seems to me calculated to interest
the careless and attract the thoughtful. It is called _The Prison Walls
must Cast no Shadow_."

With an arm outstretched he seemed to deliver the words of the title
one by one from the palm of his hand. Then he stood smiling,
confident, awaiting applause. Dick's face, which had shown the highest
expectancy, slowly fell in a profound disappointment. He laid down his
knife and fork.

"Oh, come, father. All walls cast shadows. It entirely depends upon the
altitude of the sun."

Mr. Hazlewood returned to his seat and spoke gently.

"The phrase, my boy, is a metaphor. I develop in this pamphlet my belief
that a convict, once he has expiated his offence, should upon his release
be restored to the precise position in society which he held before with
all its privileges unimpaired."

Dick chuckled in the most unregenerate delight.

"You are going it, father," he said, and disappointment came to Mr.
Hazlewood