"a coach-and-four to be got out of me." His
drop, or rather his climax, failed a little of effect,
indeed, through an undue precipitation of memory.
Something his daughter had said came back to him.
"You ve settled to give away half your little in
heritance?"

Her hesitation broke into laughter. " No I
haven't settled anything."

"But you mean, practically, to let Marian collar
it? " They stood there face to face, but she so de
nied herself to his challenge that he could only go
on. " You ve a view of three hundred a year for
her in addition to what her husband left her with?
Is that," the remote progenitor of such wantonness
audibly wondered, "your morality?"

Kate found her answer without trouble. " Is it
your idea that I should give you everything?"

The " everything " clearly struck him to the
point even of determining the tone of his reply.
"Far from it. How can you ask that when I refuse
what you tell me you came to offer? Make of my
idea what you can; I think I ve sufficiently ex
pressed it, and it's at any rate to take or to leave.
It's the only one, I may nevertheless add; it's the
basket with all my eggs. It's my conception, in
short, of your duty."

The girl's tired smile watched the word as if it
had taken on a small grotesque visibility. You re
wonderful on such subjects! I think I should leave
you in no doubt," she pursued, " that if I were to

[[20]]

p019 _ -chap- _ toc-1 _ p020w _ toc-2 _ +chap+ _ p021

v?