“This, of course, is what I discovered as soon as I had taken the agency.  I did not know my man when I accepted.  I began to know him, as soon as we really came to business.  I found him opposed to all reform—­incapable even of decent humanity.  Very well!  Was I to throw up?”

His eyes pierced into hers.  Lydia could only murmur:  “Go on.”

“Suppose I had thrown up!—­what would have happened?  The estate would have sunk, more and more lamentably, into the power of a certain low attorney who has been Melrose’s instrument in all his worst doings for years—­and of a pair of corrupt clerks in the local office.  Who would have gained?  Not a soul!  On the contrary, much would have been lost.  Heaven knows I have been able to do little enough.  But I have done something!—­I have done something!—­that is what people forget.”

He looked at her passionately; a distress rising in his eyes, which he could not hide.  Was it her silence—­the absence of any cheering, approving sound from her?

She lifted her hand, and let it drop.

“Mainstairs!” she said.  It was just breathed—­a cry of pain.

“Yes—­Mainstairs!  I know—­let us tackle Mainstairs.  Mainstairs is a horror—­a tragedy.  If I had been allowed, I should have set the whole thing right a couple of months ago; I should have re-housed some of the people, closed some of the cottages, repaired others.  Mr. Melrose stopped everything.  There again—­what good could I do by throwing up?  I had plenty of humdrum work elsewhere that was not being interfered with—­work that will tell in the long run.  I left Mainstairs to Melrose; the responsibility was his, not mine.  I went on with what I was doing.  He and the police—­thank heaven!—­cleared the place.”

“And in the clearing, Mr. Melrose, they say, never lifted a finger to help—­did not even give money,” said Lydia in the same low, restrained voice, as she looked away from her guest into the fire.  “And one sits thinking—­of all the dead—­that might have been saved!”

His frowning distress was evident.

“Do I not feel it as much as any one?” he said, with emotion.  “I was helpless!”

There was silence.  Then Lydia turned sharply toward him.

“Mr. Faversham!  Is it true that Mr. Melrose has made you his heir?”

His face changed.

“Yes—­it is true.”

“And he has refused to make any provision for his wife and daughter?”

“He has.  And more than that”—­he looked at her with a defiant candour—­“he has tried to bind me in his will to do nothing for them.”

“And you have allowed it?”

“I shall soon get round that,” he said, scornfully.  “There are a thousand ways.  Such restrictions are not worth the paper they are written on.”

“And meanwhile they are living on charity?  And Mr. Melrose, as you say, may last some years.  I saw Mrs. Melrose pass this morning in a carriage.  She looked like a dying woman.”