No doubt.  But man is entitled to self-fulfilment; and men pursue vastly different ways of obtaining it.  The perplexities of practical ethics are infinite; and mixed motives fit a mixed world.

At least he had not bartered away his uncle’s treasure.  The gems still stood to him as the symbol of something he had lost, and might some day recover.  It was really time he got them out of Melrose’s clutches...

...The room was oppressively hot!  It was a raw December night, but the heating system of the Tower was now so perfect, and to Faversham’s mind so excessive, that every corner of the large house was bathed in a temperature which seemed to keep Melrose alive, while it half suffocated every other inmate.

Suddenly the telephone bell on his writing-desk rang.  His room was now connected with Melrose’s room, at the other end of the house, as well as with Pengarth.  He put his ear to the receiver.

“Yes?”

“I want to speak to you.”

He rose unwillingly.  But at least he could air the room, which he would not have ventured to do, if Melrose were coming to him as usual for the ten minutes’ hectoring, which now served as conversation between them, before bedtime.  Going to the window which gave access to the terrace outside, he unclosed the shutters, and threw open the glass doors.  He perceived that it had begun to rain, and that the night was darkening.  He stood drinking in the moist coolness of the air for a few seconds, and then leaving the window open, and forgetting to extinguish the electric light on his table he went out of the room.

He found Melrose in his chair, his aspect thunderous and excited.

“Was it by your plotting, sir, that that girl got in?” said the old man, as he entered.

Faversham stood amazed.

“What girl?”

Melrose angrily described Felicia’s visit, adding that if Faversham knew nothing about it, it was his duty to know.  Dixon deserved dismissal for his abominable conduct; “and you, sir, are paid a large salary, not only to manage—­or mismanage—­my affairs, but also to protect your employer from annoyance.  I expect you to do it!”

Faversham took the charge quietly.  His whole relation to Melrose had altered so rapidly for the worse during the preceding weeks that no injustice or unreason surprised him.  And yet there was something strange—­something monstrous—­in the old man’s venomous temper.  After all his bribes, after all his tyranny, did he still feel something in Faversham escape him?—­some deep-driven defiance, or hope, intangible?  He seemed indeed to be always on the watch now for fresh occasions of attack that should test his own power, and Faversham’s submission.