“At that time I could not be expected to have a word to say to it.  And it has gone on ever since.”

“Yes, it has gone on ever since.”

“And when I was leaving Cambridge he required that I should not go into a profession.”

“Not exactly that, Harry.”

“It was so that I understood it.  He did not wish his heir to be burdened with a profession.  He said so to me himself.”

“Yes, just when he was in his pride because you had got your fellowship.  But there was a contract understood, if not made.”

“What contract?” asked Harry, with an air of surprise.

“That you should be to him as a son.”

“I never undertook it.  I wouldn’t have done it at the price,—­or for any price.  I never felt for him the respect or the love that were due to a father.  I did feel both of them, to the full, for my own father.  They are a sort of a thing which we cannot transfer.”

“They may be shared, Harry,” said the rector, who was flattered.

“No, sir; in this instance that was not possible.”

“You might have sat by while he read a sermon to his sister and nieces.  You understood his vanity, and you wounded it, knowing what you were doing.  I don’t mean to blame you, but it was a misfortune.  Now we must look it in the face and see what must be done.  Your mother has told you that he has written to me.  There is his letter.  You will see that he writes with a fixed purpose.”  Then he handed to Harry a letter written on a large sheet of paper, the reading of which would be so long that Harry seated himself for the operation.

The letter need not here be repeated at length.  It was written with involved sentences, but in very decided language.  It said nothing of Harry’s want of duty, or not attending to the sermons, or of other deficiencies of a like nature, but based his resolution in regard to stopping the income on his nephew’s misconduct,—­as it appeared to him,—­in a certain particular case.  And unfortunately,—­though Harry was prepared to deny that his conduct on that occasion had been subject to censure,—­he could not contradict any of the facts on which Mr. Prosper had founded his opinion.  The story was told in reference to Mountjoy Scarborough, but not the whole story.  “I understand that there was a row in the streets late at night, at the end of which young Mr. Scarborough was left as dead under the railings.”  “Left for dead!” exclaimed Harry.  “Who says that he was left for dead?  I did not think him to be dead.”

“You had better read it to the end,” said his father, and Harry read it.  The letter went on to describe how Mountjoy Scarborough was missed from his usual haunts, how search was made by the police, how the newspapers were filled with the strange incident, and how Harry had told nothing of what had occurred.  “But beyond this,” the letter went on to say, “he positively denied, in conversation with the gentleman’s brother, that he had anything