n, died of typhoid-fever before the birth of his boy.
The present heir, brilliant, weak, cynical, absolutely selfish, had
rioted to such an extent that he had fatally injured his health and
incurred the detestation of his grandfather; Lord Strathland was not
only a virtuous old gentleman but was also inclined to be miserly. The
subjects upon which they did not quarrel bitterly every time they met
were those relating to Elton Gwynne, whom both loved, in so far as they
loved any one but themselves. Deeply as they disapproved of his
politics, they respected his independence and were inordinately proud of
him. Zeal's daughters, who bored him inexpressibly, were parcelled out
among relatives, and he led a roving life in search of beneficent air
for his weary lungs. All women had become hateful to him since he had
been forced to sit in the ashes of repentance, but he had consented to
enter upon a second marriage through the most disinterested sentiment of
his life, his love of his cousin, whose haunting fear of being shelved
in his youth had been poured into his ears many times. That he also
enraged his grandfather, who wanted nothing so much as the assurance
that his favorite should inherit the territorial honors of his house,
may have given zest to his act of renunciation. Not that he had the
least intention of giving his cousin a solid basis for despair for many
years to come, for no mother ever nursed her babe more tenderly than he
his weak but by no means exhausted chest. During his last interview with
Elton in London he had assured his anxious relative that he was taking
the best of care of himself, and that, in spite of blood-shot eyes and
haggard cheeks, his disease was quiescent; although he had decided to
start for Davos or some other popular climate before the advent of harsh
weather. Davos is a word of hideous portent in English ears, but Gwynne
had expelled it with all other cares from his mind, and on this night
when he returned from Arcot feeling a far greater man than any of his
house had ever dreamed of being, and with a song in his heart, the
awful face of his cousin, whom in the shock of the moment he thought
stricken with death, gave him the first stab of terror and doubt that he
had experienced in his triumphant life.

XV

"Come up-stairs," said Zeal. "We are liable to interruption here."

"Have they put you up decently?" asked Gwynne, with his mind's surface.
"The house is rather full."

"I s