said
that only a month had gone by, and Arthur's son, from the land of
volcanoes and earthquakes, had already conquered all that he had come
to seek? He who had been labelled an impostor and a blackmailer
took--after that one interview--his place in the old man's mind, if
not in his heart. Heaven only knows--for no one else was present at
that first interview--what arguments he held, what appeals he made. He
came like a thief, bribing his way into his uncle's presence, and
stayed like a dearly loved son, a master in the house.

And Luke was shut out once and for all from Lord Radclyffe's mind and
heart. Can you conceive that such selfless affection as the older man
bore to the younger can live for a quarter of a century and die in one
hour? Yet so it seemed. Luke was shut out from that innermost recess
in Uncle Rad's heart which he had occupied, undisputed, from childhood
upward. Now he only took his place amongst the others; with Jim and
Edie and Frank, children of the younger brother, of no consequence in
the house of the reigning peer.

Luke with characteristic pride--characteristic indolence, mayhap,
where his own interests were at stake--would not fight for his
rightful position--his by right of ages, twenty years of affection, of
fidelity, and comradeship.

The day following the first momentous interview, Lord Radclyffe spent
in lawyers' company--Mr. Davies in Finsbury Court, then Mr. Dobson in
Bedford Row. The latter argued and counselled. Though papers might be
to all appearances correct and quite in order, there was no hurry to
come to a decision. But Lord Radclyffe--with that same dictatorial
obstinacy with which he had originally branded the claimant as an
impostor and a blackmailer--now clung to his reversed opinion.
Convinced--beyond doubt, apparently--that Philip de Mountford was his
brother Arthur's son, he insisted on acknowledging him openly as his
heir, and on showering on him all those luxuries and privileges which
Luke had enjoyed for so many years.

Indignant and mentally sore, Jim and Edie protested with all the
violence of youth, violence which proved as useless as it was
ill-considered. Luke said nothing, for he foresaw that the end was
inevitable. He set about making a home for his younger brothers and
sister to be ready for them as soon as the cataclysm came, when Philip
de Mountford, usurping every right, would turn his cousins out of the
old home.

Frank, absent at Santiago--a young a