“Very good; I am glad to hear he’s well enough to think of such things.”

“He means to destroy it.”

“I hope, then, he has another made.”

“Mentally, I suppose he has.”

“Unfortunately, his weakness isn’t mental—­or exclusively so.”

“Oh, he will live to make a dozen more,” I said.  “Do you know the purport of this one?”

Theodore’s color, by this time, had died away into plain white.  He shook his head.  The doggedness of the movement provoked me, and I wished to arouse his curiosity.  “I have his commission to destroy it.”

Theodore smiled very grandly.  “It’s not a task I envy you,” he said.

“I should think not—­especially if you knew the import of the will.”  He stood with folded arms, regarding me with his cold, detached eyes.  I couldn’t stand it.  “Come, it’s your property!  You are sole legatee.  I give it up to you.”  And I thrust the paper into his hand.

He received it mechanically; but after a pause, bethinking himself, he unfolded it and cast his eyes over the contents.  Then he slowly smoothed it together and held it a moment with a tremulous hand.  “You say that Mr. Sloane directed you to destroy it?” he finally inquired.

“I say so.”

“And that you know the contents?”

“Exactly.”

“And that you were about to do what he asked you?”

“On the contrary, I declined.”

Theodore fixed his eyes for a moment on the superscription and then raised them again to my face.  “Thank you, Max,” he said.  “You have left me a real satisfaction.”  He tore the sheet across and threw the bits into the fire.  We stood watching them burn.  “Now he can make another,” said Theodore.

“Twenty others,” I replied.

“No,” said Theodore, “you will take care of that.”

“You are very bitter,” I said, sharply enough.

“No, I am perfectly indifferent.  Farewell.”  And he put out his hand.

“Are you going away?”

“Of course I am.  Good-by.”

“Good-by, then.  But isn’t your departure rather sudden?”

“I ought to have gone three weeks ago—­three weeks ago.”  I had taken his hand, he pulled it away; his voice was trembling—­there were tears in it.

“Is that indifference?” I asked.

“It’s something you will never know!” he cried.  “It’s shame!  I am not sorry you should see what I feel.  It will suggest to you, perhaps, that my heart has never been in this filthy contest.  Let me assure you, at any rate, that it hasn’t; that it has had nothing but scorn for the base perversion of my pride and my ambition.  I could easily shed tears of joy at their return—­the return of the prodigals!  Tears of sorrow—­sorrow—­”

He was unable to go on.  He sank into a chair, covering his face with his hands.

“For God’s sake, stick to the joy!” I exclaimed.

He rose to his feet again.  “Well,” he said, “it was for your sake that I parted with my self-respect; with your assistance I recover it.”