They parted company there and then.  Tavernake and Beatrice went down the hill in silence.

“Does this bother you at all?” she inquired presently.

“Nothing to speak of,” Tavernake answered.  “It had to come.  I wasn’t quite ready but that doesn’t matter.”

“What shall you do now?” she asked.

“Borrow enough to buy the whole of the hill,” he replied.

She looked back.

“Won’t that mean a great deal of money?”

He nodded.

“It will be a big thing, of course,” he admitted.  “Never mind, I dare say I shall be able to interest some one in it.  In any case, I never meant Mr. Dowling to make a fortune out of this.”

They walked on in silence a little further.  Then she spoke again, with some hesitation.

“I suppose that what you have done is quite fair, Leonard?”

He answered her promptly, without any sign of offence at her question.

“As a matter of fact,” he confessed, “it is an unusual thing for any one in the employ of a firm of estate agents to make speculations on their own account in land.  In this case, however, I consider that I was justified.  I have opened up three building speculations for the firm, on each one of which they have made a great deal of money, and I have not even had my salary increased, or any recognition whatever offered me.  There is a debt, of course, which an employee owes to his employer.  There is also a debt, however, which the employer owes to his employee.  In my case I have never been treated with the slightest consideration of any sort.  What I have done I shall stick to.  After all, I am more interested in making money for myself than for other people.”

They had reached the corner of the field now, and turning into the lane commenced the steep descent.  It was Sunday evening, and from all the little conventicles and tin churches below, the bells began their unmusical summons.  From further away in the distance came the more melodious chiming from the Cathedral and the city churches.  The shriller and nearer note, however, prevailed.  The whole medley of sound was a discord.  As they descended, they could see the black-coated throngs slowly moving towards the different places of worship.  There was something uninspiring about it all.  She shuddered.

“Leonard,” she said, “I wonder why you are so anxious to get on in the world.  Why do you want to be rich?”

He was glancing back toward the hill, the light of calculations in his eyes.  Once more he was measuring out those plots of land, calculating rent, deducting interest.

“We all seek different things,” he replied tolerantly,—­“some fame, some pleasure.  Mr. Dowling, for instance, has no other ambition than to muddle round the golf links a few strokes better than his partner.”

“And you?” she asked.

“It is success I seek,” he answered.  “Women, as a rule, do not understand.  You, for instance, Beatrice, are too sentimental.  I am very practical.  It is money that I want.  I want money because money means success.”