We passed Mr. Carvel’s room and went down the little corridor over the ball-room, until we came to the full-storied wing.  My uncle flung open the window and shutters opposite and gave me the key.  A delicacy not foreign to him held him where he was.  Time had sealed the door, and when at last it gave before my strength, a shower of dust quivered in the ray of sunlight from the window.  I entered reverently.  I took only the silverbound prayer-book, cast a lingering look at the old familiar objects dimly defined, and came out and locked the door again.  I said very quietly that I would send for the things that afternoon, for my anger was hushed by what I had seen.

We halted together on the uncovered porch in front of the house, that had a seat set on each side of it.  Marlboro’ Street was still, the wide trees which flanked it spreading their shade over walk and roadway.  Not a soul was abroad in the midday heat, and the windows of the long house opposite were sightless.

“Richard,” said my uncle, staring ahead of him, “I came to offer you a home, and you insult me brutally, as you have done unreproved all your life.  And yet no one shall say of me that I shirk my duty.  But first I must ask you if there is aught else you desire of me.”

“The black boy, Hugo, is mine,” I said.  I had no great love for Hugo, save for association’s sake, and I had one too many servants as it was; but to rescue one slave from Grafton’s clutches was charity.

“You shall have him,” he replied, “and your chaise, and your wardrobe, and your horses, and whatever else I have that belongs to you.  As I was saying, I will not shirk my duty.  The memory of my dear father, and of what he would have wished, will not permit me to let you go a-begging.  You shall be provided for out of the estate, despite what you have said and done.”

This was surely the quintessence of a rogue’s imagination.  Instinctively I shrank from him.  With a show of piety that ’turned me sick he continued: 

“Let God witness that I carry out my father’s will!”

“Stop there, Grafton Carvel!” I cried; “you shall not take His name in vain.  Under this guise of holiness you and your accomplice have done the devil’s own work, and the devil will reward you.”

This reference to Mr. Allen, I believe, frightened him.  For a second only did he show it.

“My—­my accomplice, sir!” he stammered.  And then righting himself:  “You will have to explain this, by Heaven.”

“In ample time your plot shall be laid bare, and you and his Reverence shall hang, or lie in chains.”

“You threaten, Mr. Carvel?” he shouted, nearly stepping off the porch in his excitement.

“Nay, I predict,” I replied calmly.  And I went down the steps and out of the gate, he looking after me.  Before I had turned the corner of Freshwater Lane, he was in the seat, and fanning himself with his hat.