As the hour was late, Scott found it necessary to devote himself at once to his work, and he had but just completed it when the sound of wheels was heard outside, and a few moments later his employer entered the room.

The latter studied Mr. Carruthers’s card quite attentively, and frowned upon learning that his intentions regarding the making of his will had become known by outsiders, but he soon seemed to forget the occurrence.  Soon all were gathered about the dinner-table, and the evening passed very pleasantly.

When, at a late hour, Hugh Mainwaring, in the dimly-lighted veranda, bade his guests good-night, he grasped the hand of his namesake and said, in a tone remarkably tender,-

“Hugh, my boy, the distance is long between the twenty-first and the fiftieth mile-stones on the journey of life.  Heaven grant, when you shall have reached the latter, you may look back over a brighter pathway than I do to-night!”

Then, as the young man passed, he murmured to himself “If I could but have had just such a son as he!”

He did not see, though there was one who did, a woman’s form glide away in the dim light, her eyes gleaming with malignant fire.

CHAPTER IV

A TERRIBLE AWAKENING

For some time after his guests had retired, Hugh Mainwaring remained outside, walking up and down in the starlight, apparently absorbed in thought.  When at length he passed into the house, he met his secretary coming out for a solitary smoke.

“Come to my library, Mr. Scott, before you retire for the night,” said Mr. Mainwaring.

“At once, sir, if you wish,” the secretary replied.

“No, there is no hurry; any time within an hour,” and he passed up-stairs.

Half an hour later Harry Scott passed down the corridor towards the library, but paused on hearing an angry voice within, which he at once recognized as Mrs. LaGrange’s.

“Where would you be to-night?” she cried, “where would you have been all these years, if I had but exposed your dishonesty and duplicity?  You defrauded your only brother during his lifetime; you have persistently ignored your son, your own flesh and blood; and now you would rob him, not only of his father’s name, but of his father’s fortune, — cast him off with a mere pittance, — and put this stranger in the place which is rightfully his, and wish that you had been given such a son as he!  You are in my power, and you know it only too well; and I will make you and your high-born, purse-proud family rue this day’s work.”

Hugh Mainwaring’s reply to this tirade was inaudible, and Scott, feeling that he already had heard too much, withdrew, and continued walking up and down the halls until the library door opened and Mrs. LaGrange came out.  She swept past him in a towering rage, seeming scarcely aware of his presence until, as he passed down the corridor and entered the library, he was suddenly conscious that she had turned and was watching him.